Teen Technique

TEEN TECHNIQUE WITH JEN POLINS, KATE MARTEL and guests!

Teen Technique is on hour workout that offers a combination of dance training and conditioningl. Every class includes stretching, strengthening, modern/contemporary ballet combinations and doing some improvising. Some prior dance training required, Intermediate level.

Train with the Hatchery Dance Company and other teens in the Valley!

Check out Hatchery here!

Jennifer Polins is a curator, mobilizer, movement practitioner and performance maker, bridging somatics -performance practices- and contemporary dance techniques for over 25 years. Jen is the founding director of The School for Contemporary Dance and Thought, holds an MFA in dance from Hollins University/The American Dance Festival and is a 2014 MCC choreographic fellow. Jen is also the assistant programmer for A.P.E.@Hawley. She has danced professionally in America and Europe, starting with the Joffrey Ballet, Milwaukee Ballet and then the Zurich Operahouse Ballet companies before migrating to a professional career in contemporary performance art. Jen is specialized in rigorous improvisational practices and worked closely with many mentors most notably- Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, Nancy Stark Smith, Steve Paxton, and Lisa Nelson. Jen is certified in Pilates, Gyrotonic, Gyrokinesis, Yoga, and Massage. She studied Body Mind Centering for over 10 years and all of these somatic practices deeply affect her curation, teaching and making. Jen is guest lecturer in the Five College Dance department. She is the co-founder of Wire Monkey Dance where produced over 20 productions throughout America, Europe and Asia. Jen lives between Berlin and Northampton where she creates work, curates artists, connects communities and teaches. With SCDT, Jen is in close collaborative relationships with A.P.E.@ Hawley, San Francisco’s La Alternativa, Boston’s New Movement Collaborative, and Northampton’s Community Arts Trust. Jen is working on the creative team of the Ponderosa TanzLand Festival beside Stephanie Maher. She has collaborated most recently with Maurice Fraga, Joy Davis, Jen Nugent, Stephanie Maher, Peter Schmitz, Sarah Shelton Mann, Paul Matteson and James Morrow.

KATE MARTEL, MFA, M.AmSAT is a dance artist and Alexander Technique teacher based in Western Massachusetts. She enjoyed fifteen years dancing in NYC with choreographers Laura Peterson, Nora Stephens, Rebecca Brooks, Luis Lara Malvacias and Sarah White-Ayon, among others. During this time she trained in the Alexander Technique with master teacher Ann Rodiger, graduating from the Balance Arts Center in 2017. Her choreography has been presented by SCDT (WIP), Women in Motion, Movement Research at Judson Church, Center for Performance Research and Purdue University. She has been on faculty at Mason Gross School of the Arts, Adelphi University and Western Connecticut State University. In addition, she has earned a BA from Goucher College in Dance and Education (2002) and an MFA in Performing Arts from University of Wisconsin Milwaukee (2014). Kate has been a collaborator with Barbie Diewald Choreography since 2017 and is currently on faculty at Westfield State University. She teaches AT privately and in the Somatics Series at SCDT, as well as teaching ballet and modern throughout the Pioneer Valley.​