Why choose Elite?

Ashley Deets

Artistic Director

Instructor & Choreographer

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Elite alumna Ashley Deets is an award-winning dancer, teacher, and choreographer in Chicagoland.  She is a certified Acrobatic Arts, Rhythm Works Integrative Dance, and Wingman for Dance educator. Deets graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a BFA in Dance and a minor in Business Administration. When not at Elite, she loves spending time with her husband and two boys, Hank and Levi. With over two decades of dance and performance experience, Ashley is thrilled to do what she loves each day!

Paige Deets

Business Manager

EDC Team Leader

Instructor & Choreographer

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Paige Deets is a professional dancer, certified teacher, and award-winning choreographer. She attended Western Michigan University and graduated in the spring of 2015 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in dance. Paige has since trained on scholarship at Visceral Dance Center and in Kibbutz Ga’aton Israel under the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company. Deets has danced with numerous companies including Project Bound, Trifecta Dance Collective, Geometry Dance Company, and Canv(us) Movement Collective under the direction of Gerran Reese. She has appeared as a dancer and model in many music videos and live performances for artists including Half the Animal, Niki Black, Mickey Singh, ICON BLU, and Josi Maran. Her choreography has won numerous awards in showcase, competition, and festival settings. Deets has taught in many dance studios as well as private, charter, public, and inner-city schools across the country inspiring her to get her teaching certification in physical education and dance which she received in 2021. Paige now resides in the Chicago land area and is represented by Go-2 Talent Agency.

Renée Deets

Owner

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Renee studied Social Work and Child Psychology at Carthage College.
Elite Dance Academy was born from her passion for the hearts of children and
the desire to not only provide the highest level of dance discipline in the
community, but more importantly create a safe place for children to gain not only
the obvious physical benefits but the confidence, self-esteem, kindness, and
compassion that are critical in developmental years.
 

Renee and her husband have lived in Homer Glen for 32 years where they raised
three children and now enjoy two grandchildren.

Gina Matsie

EDC Director

Instructor & Choreographer

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Gina Matsie graduated from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance and a Bachelor of Liberal Arts and Sciences in Psychology. While obtaining her Dance degree, she had the pleasure to perform in new works by Tere O’Connor, Earl Mosley, Abby Zbikowski, and Kemal Nance. Gina trained with Kate Kuper in her Creative Dance for Children program from 2014-2016. Alongside her teaching experience, Gina is also a certified M1 Acrobatic Arts Instructor and a program developer for DiscoverDance. She has been a part of the Elite family for the past 5 years now, and this year serving as the Company Director. Gina is thrilled to enter in this new role and help the dancers reach their highest potential! 

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Laura Witter

EDC Team Leader

Instructor & Choreographer

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Laura Witter grew up dancing in the Boston area and attended Point Park University as a dance major with a concentration in jazz. She relocated to Chicago area in 2000, after receiving a Merit Scholarship to continue her training at the Giordano Dance Center in Evanston. She was one of the founding members of Chicago Tap Theatre, under the direction of Mark Yonally. With CTT, Laura performed locally, nationally, and internationally from 2002-2011. Highlighted events included Jazz Dance World Congress, Lollapalooza, New York City Musical Theater Festival, and multiple tours to the South of France. Laura has been a guest artist for Audible Odyssey, jorsTAP Chicago, Chicago Dance Crash, the MASSIVE, Thodos Dance Chicago’s New Dances, and for independent choreographers Paul Christiano, Jon Lehrer, and Jay Franke. From 2010-2016, Laura danced as a company member of Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre, under the direction of Wilfredo Rivera. With CRDT, she was blessed to dance all over Chicago, including the Auditorium and Harris Theaters, and perform in Barcelona, Spain. As a dance educator, Laura founded and directed the Artistry in Motion Dance Company, housed within the Des Plaines Park District. She is excited for another season on staff at Elite Dance Academy and looks forward to her new role as Competitive Team Co-Leader.

Rebecca Dankovich

EDC Team Leader

Instructor & Choreographer

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Rebecca graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a BFA in Dance. During her time at Illinois, Rebecca trained in modern, ballet, improvisation, West African, and hip hop techniques while also honing in on her passion for choreography in numerous dance composition courses. Rebecca was a teaching assistant for hip hop and jazz dance elective courses at the university and assisted in the CreativeDance for Children program in the Department of Dance, under the direction of Kate Kuper. She has performed at the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts in department main stage works choreographed by Jennifer Monson, Rebecca Nettl-Fiol, Sheldon Smith, Jessie Young, and Abby Zbikowski. After graduation, Rebecca began teaching dance, working with all age groups and styles of dance. She also is the choreographer for the Nazareth Academy Drama Program. Rebecca recently became certified to teach Pure Barre, and teaches in the Logan Square location.  

Lezlie Gray

Instructor & Choreographer

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Lezlie Gray was born and raised in Wilmington, Delaware. She began her formal training in Ballet, Pointe, Modern, and Jazz with Delaware Dance Company (DDC) under Sunshine Webster-Latshaw and Sherry Hiott. She performed in many productions throughout the years with DDC where she had the opportunity to dance soloist and principal roles. During her high school years, she attended Ballet Magnificat’s Summer Intensive, local dance festivals, Regional Dance America, and YAGP semi-finals in Philadelphia and Boston. These events provided exposure to different styles and instructors, as well as recognition through scholarships. After graduating from high school in 2018, she moved to Jackson, Mississippi to further her dance education and danced with Ballet Magnificat as a Trainee. In 2019, Lezlie joined Ballet 5:8’s Professional Company and continues to dance with them as a Company Artist performing in Chicago, the Midwest, and across the Nation. She most recently had the opportunity to perform a principal role in Julianna Rubio Slager’s world premiere of Reckless. She has taught various dance styles throughout the past several years at The School of Ballet 5:8 and has enjoyed sharing her passion and expertise as a Ballet and Pointe Instructor here at Elite!

Julia Zic

Instructor & Choreographer

Julia Zic is a recent graduate of Columbia College Chicago with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Dance. Throughout her dance career in Chicago, Julia has trained in numerous styles of dance including modern, ballet, contemporary, hip hop, West African, improvisation, and dance composition. She has trained and performed with artists such as Keesha Beckford, Zineb Chraribi, Paige Cunningham, and Dardi McGinley-Gallivan. She also had the opportunity to take master classes with members from Merce Cunningham Company, Natya Dance Theater, and Urban Bush Women. Julia is originally from Frankfort, IL where she trained, danced competitively and gained teaching experience in technique and creative movement at The Dance Company. Julia is currently teaching and on the administrative staff at Forevermore Dance & Theatre Arts in Chicago. She is thrilled to continue growing as a dance educator and sharing her love for dance with Elite!

Hannah Anderson

Instructor & Choreographer

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Hannah started dancing when she was 8 years old. She fell in love with ballet at her home studio in Morgan Hill, California, where she had the opportunities to perform many lead roles in classical ballets, while exploring the contemporary world as well. As she continued to grow, her summers were spent training all around the country with American Ballet Theater in New York City, Ballet Austin, Colorado Ballet, and more. She danced for two years in the professional track program at State Street Ballet where she dove deeper into both classical and contemporary training, and performed with the professional company. She then spent two years dancing with Ballet 5:8, where she had many performance opportunities, including new works and lead roles in their productions of the Nutcracker. Having been greatly inspired by her teachers, she is now fully invested in teaching! She has taught a wide range of ages in the Chicagoland area, as well as directing rehearsals and guest performing. Hannah is passionate about bringing the art of dance to the next generation of dancers with care, excellence, and grace.

Christian English

Instructor & Choreographer

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Christian English was born and raised in Amarillo, Texas. He started his training in Ballet and Contemporary Ballet with Doxa Dance Ministry, under Brittany Wooten and Mark Leber. He performed in many original productions throughout the years with Doxa where He had opportunities to dance soloist and principal roles. After graduating from high school, he moved to Tinley Park to further his training and dance professionally with Ballet 5:8 as a Trainee. While a trainee, he has had the opportunity to perform with the company in Julianna Rubio Slager’s world premiere of BareFace. During the upcoming 2023/2024 season Christian will be joining Ballet 5:8’s Professional Company as a Company Apprentice, performing across the United States. He is excited to have the opportunity to help further students' technique at Elite and share his love for dance!

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Anna Volkman

Instructor & Choreographer

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Elite alumna Anna Volkman began her lifelong journey with dance at the young age of 2. She continued on to earn her Bachelor of Arts in dance and marketing at Western Michigan University. From there, she moved cross-country to Los Angeles where she trained in the commercial dance industry while maintaining a steady foot in the teaching little ones. After 5 years of chasing a professional dance career there, she moved back to her roots in Homer Glen. Only then was she able to return to the
foundation of her passion for dance, Elite Dance Academy. Volkman is now ready to share what she learned all those years with every dancer that walks through those doors, hopefully making a lasting
impact on them like Elite did for her.

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Jodi Tanrikulu

Support Staff​

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Jodi has an Associate of Arts degree from Moraine Valley and a Para Professional Certification through the state of Illinois. She has taught preschool for 22 years and currently is teaching at Happy Hands Preschool in Lemont. She has been married to her husband, Dennis for 36 years and has two sons. Joshua and his wife live in Greenville,South Carolina. With Jodi’s amazing 21 month old Grandson, Jack. Andy lives in Homer Glen, and keeps busy selling cars and playing sports. Jodi loves spending time with family and friends and reading (preferably on the beach of course). She loves working with children and nurturing their growing little minds and enjoys the loving family atmosphere here at Elite!