FACULTY DIRECTORY

CHORAL & VOCAL METHODS

Jennifer completed her undergraduate degree in Music Education from DePaul School of Music, DePaul University in Chicago, Illinois, and her Master’s in Vocal Performance from Hunter College in New York. Jennifer has taught in London, New York City, and most recently has been the Music Coordinator at Hanover High School for 10 years. She currently serves on the NH All State choral committee and is the President elect for the New England Music Festival Association. She holds her CAGS from New England College and is one of the founding members of NESA.

DANCE

Jennifer is an experienced dance teacher and dance coach specializing in technical training and performance preparation. She is classically trained in the Vaganova method of ballet, classical modern techniques (Horton & Graham), and jazz (Luigi, Maddox, Hachett). She graduated from North Carolina School of the Arts in 1989, and supplemented her training with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre from 1985-1991 before being signed, working and traveling with the Campbell Agency (Dallas) and Fontaine Agency (Los Angeles). In addition to walking the runways in New York, Dallas and Los Angeles, Jennifer worked in print, editorial, catalog, and commercial television advertising. Jennifer is one of the founding members of NESA.

THEATRE

Ashley Barrow hails originally from Hendersonville, NC and received her BA in Theatre Arts and Dance minor from Catawba College, in Salisbury, NC. Her theatre credits include Cape Fear Regional Theatre, South Carolina Children’s Theatre, North Carolina Theatre, Springer Opera House, Hanover High School, City Center Ballet, and Opera North. Ashley’s most recent engagement was as the Theatre Programming Coordinator for Artistree and the Grange Theatre in South Pomfret, VT. She is one of the original founding members of NESA.

HUMANITIES

Alexis Schleicher grew up in Norwich, Vermont, studied abroad in high school, attended college in Los Angeles, and worked in New York City before returning to the Upper Valley to pursue teaching. She has worked in private elementary schools and public high schools, museums, and has taught English, Social Studies, and a Flexible Pathways course at Hartford High School in WRJ, VT. She holds a BA in Art History & English from Occidental College and a M.Ed from New England College. She is a Highly Qualified Teacher in secondary English and Social Studies, and was 2020 VT Teacher of the Year Finalist.

PHYSICS

Honor Passow, PhD, P.E. works full-time at Dartmouth College, teaching statistics and research methods and serving as the Director of Academic Affairs in the Master of Public Health program. She started her career in engineering after bachelors and masters degrees in mechanical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.). Dr. Passow is a registered professional engineer. As a Product Engineer at Siemens, she analyzed products returned from the field to identify the root causes of failures and devise corrective actions. Her passion for teaching was active early in her career as she trained newly hired engineers during the day and -- at night -- taught calculus and engineering physics courses at local colleges. Wanting to know more about teaching and learning led her to a PhD in Education at the University of Michigan with a focus on the teaching and learning of engineering subjects, especially physics. She has coached a winning high school team to design and build a robot in the FIRST robotics competitions. She is excited to help NESA students learn about themselves and the world through physics, in a part-time role.

STAGE PRODUCTION

Skip Cady, presently teaching for the Upper Valley Circus Collective, has a BFA from MECA in metalsmithing and jewelry. Skip has been performing for 45 years and teaching in the upper valley theater, circus arts, special F/X, set design and stage combat. He has consulted for non profits helping to bring creativity into public school programs in VT and created and acted in exercises for Russel Keat LLC. He specializes in teaching knife making and received an IMDb movie credit for building a costume for the movie "Lost Nation " with Jay Cravin as the director.