Cathy Nicoli completed her MFA in Dance at Smith College on a teaching fellowship and completed her BA Cum Laude in Dance and Performance Studies at Roger Williams University. She is a two-time recipient of both the Rhode Island State Council of the Arts' Choreography Award and the Rhode Island Foundation's Joseph Cirino Scholarship for Arts Education. She has been honored by the American College Dance Festival in their request to perform her solo work at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Cathy can be seen in the Ben Folds Five MTV music video Underground - to which she was also Assistant Choreographer. As a teacher Cathy has taught extensively in the academic and master teaching of dance. She has worked with students ranging from elementary to university levels - from rural Alaskan towns to the inner-cities of New England. She has taught and choreographed for Amherst College, Brown University, Keene State College, Providence College, Rhode Island School of Design, Roger Williams University, and Smith College. As a long time dancer and choreographer for Groundwerx Dance Theatre, and as the company’s Co-Director of Dance Education, Cathy managed and taught the modern dance company's lecture/demonstration series and choreographed works on countless private and public schools: Moses Brown Private High School, Providence's Hope High, AS220's Youth Arts Conferences, Rhode Island School for the Deaf, Rhode Island State Services for the Blind, and CityArts Inner-City Arts Program, to name a few. Cathy is now an original member of Heidi Henderson's Elephant Jane Dance Company and a dedicated part of Bearnstow Camp, a summer arts and nature retreat for adults and children in Mt. Vernon, ME. Most recently, she has joined the faculty of Hampshire College as Visiting Assistant Professor of Dance, where she will be teaching dance technique, invention, and methodology. (Appointed 2005)