Meet our 2022 Faculty
Amanda Cleghorn
Taylor James
Teya Wild
Juliana Kelly
Ashley Schofield
Amanda Cleghorn
Jazz
Amanda Cleghorn was born and raised in Mississauga, Ontario. She is a versatile dancer and performer with a background and passion for teaching and choreography. After finishing as the lead female on So You Think You Can Dance Canada Season 3, Amanda moved to Los Angeles to launch her career. She has since performed on numerous television shows, feature films, world tours, music videos, commercials, and award shows.
Amanda is best known as a dancer on Taylor Swift’s RED world tour and as a featured dancer on The Masked Singer, Schmigadoon and Lip Sync Battle. Some of her latest performances were on Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, Drunk History, Dancing with the Stars, as well as an acting role on the hit CW television show Crazy Ex Girlfriend.
Amanda has also performed with popular artists such as, Kygo, Halsey, Jessie J, Kelly Clarkson, Beyoncé, Wayne Brady and The Jacksons. She recently finished filming three Netflix projects including tv shows Lucifer, Julie and The Phantoms, as well as the Christmas Chronicles 2 movie. Another project Amanda recently completed is the soon-to-be released Apple TV feature film called Spirited starring Ryan Reynolds, Will Ferrell and Octavia Spencer.
Amanda’s worked with the most high-profile choreographers and directors in the industry including Kenny Ortega, Mandy Moore, Tyce Diorio, Nappytabs and Kathryn Burns and has assisted Emmy Award Winning Choreographer Mia Michaels across North America. Amanda’s graced the stages of many major award shows including the Grammy Awards, Brit Awards, American Music Awards, Country Music Awards, Macy’s 4th of July Special, and most recently the Billboard Awards performing with Taylor Swift and Brandon Urie. Amanda has also appeared in Pop Star, Camp Rock 2 and the remake of the 1983 Valley Girl film as well as GLEE, The Goldbergs and The X Factor.
Amanda is also the creator and director of ACC, a one-on-one exclusive program built on her passion for the performing arts. The program is for aspiring professional dancers who are seeking further advice to reach their goals and take their careers to the next level. She strives to make dancers better in all facets of professional dance from creating a stellar portfolio, building confidence in interviews, standing out in auditions to professional video evaluations, agency referrals and advice on creating a ‘dance’ life balance. The entertainment industry is where she belongs; her knowledge, versatility, and love for all forms of art is second to none. Amanda truly lives for an audience, to perform on stage and in front of the camera.
Taylor James
Broadway Jazz
Taylor James has become an internationally recognized performer since moving to Los Angeles in 2011. His skills and versatility have quickly established him as one the top dancers and choreographers in the industry. While living in Canada he competed on season 2 of So You Think You Can Dance Canada as well as behind the scenes on the 3rd and 4th season as an Assistant to many of the choreographers.
Since moving to Los Angeles, Taylor has had the opportunity to work with many of the top artists and choreographers in the industry.
You can currently see Taylor in the feature film The Greatest Showman playing “Blockhead” one of the dancing oddities. Taylor has worked on 3 seasons of Lip Sync Battle with many A-List celebrities including Beyonce. He has toured the US with Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star, Erika Jayne and shooting for the Real Housewives reality show.
His most recent credits include national commercials for AT&T, McDonalds, Crocs, H&R Block, Victoria’s Secret, Sketchers, Pepsi, and the Voice, starring in the Stuart Weitzman campaign alongside Gisele Bundchen directed by Mario Testino, touring internationally and shooting multiple music videos with Jennifer Lopez, a South American tour with Ricky Martin, promotion for Michael Jackson’s XSCAPE album including the “Love Never Felt So Good” MV and iconic hologram performance on the 2014 Billboard Awards, Disney’s ‘Descendants’ directed by Kenny Ortega, and performing and assisting on the 2014 Oscars promo starring Ellen Degeneres.
Teya Wild
Hip Hop
Teya Wild, is no stranger to the limelight. As a child, Teya discovered a love for acting. She has worked as an actor on jobs such as, Head Over Heels, A Storm In Summer, The Outer Limits, Radio Disney, Kohl’s Clothing, AmSouth, Kodak, and Crystal Light, to name a few.
Following her acting career, dance quickly became a passion of Teya’s. She began a professional dance career at a young age and as a passionate learner, she used every opportunity as a means to better herself and her craft. Training and competing professionally her whole life, Teya's expertise include a wide variety of styles such as, Hip hop, foundations (popping, locking, house, breaking), jazz, lyrical, theatre,
contemporary, tap, and pointe to name a few. Teya is also a R.A.D. ballet honours graduate.
Teya’s hard work and versatility has led her to world wide opportunities. Some of Teya's credits include: Assistant Choreographer for Disney Movie: Zombies 3, The Emmy Awards, Choreographer for Carnival Cruise Line, Royal Caribean Cruise Ship, Touring the US with recording artist Hailee Steinfeld, Taylor Swift, The Voice, Idiotsitter, CW TV Show - Riverdale, Dancer/Assistant Choreographer for Netflix movie – Work It, Assisting Choreography for Actor/Singer: Laura Marano, The American Music Awards, The 59th Annual Grammy Awards, The BET awards, Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, Sneakerella, Christmas Chronicles 2, The Twilight Zone, DC’S Legends Of Tomorrow, Feature Film- Step Up 5: All in, Freaky Friday, Disney’s Descendants 2 & Descendants 3, Make Your Move, So You Think You Can Dance Canada: Season 4, Zapped (Disney film), Much Music Video Awards (PSY performance), Over the Rainbow, Russell Peter's Christmas Special, Percy Jackson and the Olympians, The Lightning Thief, Victoria Duffield's Western Canada Tour, Spectacular (Nickelodeon film), Another Cinderella Story, Centre Stage 2: Turn it Up.
Teya is a judge and adjudicator for many competitions across Canada and America. She has toured all over the world dancing and teaching Hip Hop's history. She has over 20 years of experience teaching and choreographing high-ranked competitive dancers from all over the world. She is continuously pushing her dancers to new heights and teaching them the skills and importance of being a well rounded dancer/ performer.
Teya currently resides in Los Angeles, California where she is continuing her professional dance career. Since moving to LA, she has been fortunate enough to work closely with leading industry choreographers such as, Jamal Sims, Luther Brown, Kenny Ortega, Christopher Scott, Aakomon Jones, Draico Johnson, Nappytabs, Fatima Robinson, Tony Testa, and Keone & Mari, to name a few.
As Teya continues to travel back and forth between Canada and the United States, she is consistently setting new goals for herself and helping to guide the next generation to follow their dreams and never stop believing in themselves.
Juliana Kelly
Tap
Dance has always been a big part of Juliana's life. Beginning her training age of three, she studied in ballet, jazz, tap, lyrical, hip hop, pointe, and acrobatics at a competitive level, where she competed across Canada and the United States. Since 2004, her focus has shifted to specializing in tap dance.
Upon graduation of high school, Juliana joined Downbeats Tap Company under the direction of Cathy Duncan where she danced for two years performing in the East Coast Tap Conference (ECTC), Taking the Rhythm Train, Embrace the Rhythm, Toronto's Live in Culture Campaign and many other shows across Ontario. Currently Juliana works as a contributing artist with the Toronto Rhythm Initiative (TRI), a collective of tap dancers committed to voicing the artistry of Toronto’s
professional tap dance community. With the Toronto Rhythm Initiative she has performed in twelve TRI shows to date. She has sat on the faculty for TRI's Youth Ensemble for many years, and in 2016 began working as co-producer for TRI's Summer Youth Intensive.
Juliana spent time studying abroad with Heather Cornell, and performed in Walk To The Beat (Nyack, New York), Rhythm Lives! (Montreal Tap Festival) alongside living legend Arthur Duncan and members of Tapestry Dance Company, as well as performing in the Inaugural Toronto Body Percussion Festival (Allison Toffan). She performed in Ron Davis' SymphRONica, and The Inaugural Toronto International Tap Festival (both choreographed by Dianne Montgomery), as well as Rhythm & Sound's Illumination (Johnathan Morin and Cori Giannotta), and sat on faculty for the Rhythm, Body, & Soul Tap Festival (Calgary) and The Cleveland Tap Experience (Cleveland). Most recently, Juliana performed and choreographed for Fall For Dance North's Perspective In Rhythm (curated by Allison Toffan and Michael Caldwell) and has accepted a new position as co-producer of the bi-annual Toronto International Tap Dance Festival.
Juliana's love of dance has also led her to many opportunities as an educator including guest choreography and classes, summer intensives, workshops, conventions, seminars, and adjudication. Her main focus is as a teacher and choreographer, with a specialization in tap. She has received multiple accolades for her work, and her students are well known in the dance community for their technical and musical excellence. In 2016, Juliana founded The Rhythm Ensemble, a pre-professional tap dance company dedicated to providing unique training and performance opportunities to serious tap dancers. She strives to spread the love, and respect of tap dance and it's community to all her dancers.
Ashley Schofield
Contemporary
Ashley Schofield is a passionate, motivated choreographer and teacher from Toronto, ON. She is the founder and choreographer for Opus Dance Collective, a contemporary company housing pre-professional and professional dancers. Her company debuted her work at the Capezio ACE Awards in both NYC and Los Angeles in front of an influential audience and panel of judges. They have since continued to train and perform across Canada and the US. Ashley’s choreography and company can be seen on NBC’s World of Dance Season 2, as her Opus dancers battled it out amongst the top dancers in the world. She also had the honour of being selected to present a piece of choreography at the APAP Conference in NYC. Thus far, Ashley and Opus Dance
Collective are proud to have presented two full-length shows in Toronto - Volume 1: FORE/word and Volume 2: The Introduction. She has also choreographed, directed, styled, and produced multiple digital concept pieces.
Ashley has been recognized for her creative concepts, artistry and choreography at both national and international levels of competition. Her choreography has been displayed across Canada and the US at the YAGP Finals in NYC, the Dance Awards, Global News Morning Show, charitable events and fundraisers, fashion shows, virtual concerts, promotional teams representing retail and media companies, along with numerous studio regional and national competitions.
Miss Schofield attended, by audition, the National Choreographer's Intensive at Utah Valley University. While in attendance, she had the opportunity to work, study and create under the guidance of Nelly van Bommel. Ashley is a certified ADAPT & PBT teacher, and recently completed a course and examination by Intimacy Coordinators of Colour that allows her to act as an Intimacy Captain on set.
Ashley enjoys taking part in many annual industry events including Toronto’s Choreographer’s Ball, Hit The Floor All-Star Showcase, and TKFW (Toronto Kids Fashion Week) - she is also honoured to create work for World Performers Canada, a team that represents Canada at the Dance World Cup in Europe.