Meet Our Staff

teacher bios

Hayley Stovcik

Owner, Artistic Director, Instructor & Choreographer

Hayley Stovcik's dance education began at the age of 3 in ballet, tap and jazz classes; with baton, acrobatics, modern, lyrical, hip hop, Pointe, voice and violin being added to her weekly repertoire of lessons soon after. She started dancing competitively in elementary school, and continued to do so until graduating from high school in 2003. Outside of the dance studio, Hayley was a four year member and captain of the Strongsville High School Dance Team and was cast as a performer in Sesame Street...Live! By way of the Universal Dance Association (UDA), Hayley was chosen and danced in the Annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City in 2002. From 2003-2004, Hayley attended Baldwin Wallace University while majoring in Criminal Justice, performed for both the Football and Basketball seasons on the BWU dance team and was cast in numerous student and faculty dance concerts and recitals. In 2004, Hayley transferred to Ohio University in order to pursue a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science. She auditioned and was accepted into the acclaimed Ohio University School of Dance; where she studied dance history, theory, stage production, Pilates, jazz and African technique in addition to her required daily dance schedule, which consisted of ballet, modern and composition lab classes. In 2007, Hayley graduated Magna Cum Laude from Ohio University with a degree in Political Science and a minor in Dance Choreography and Performance. After graduating from college, Hayley worked as a Business Development Specialist and Transportation Broker for the Allen Lund Company, through which she became a member of the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals and the Cleveland Professional 20/30 Club. She has taught dance locally, at both a competitive and recreational level, since 2007; and her work has been recognized with Overall High Score, Ultimate Precision, Best in Show, Ultimate Showmanship, Best Technique, Most Entertaining, Video of the Week, Most Crowd Pleasing, Top Choreography and Title Soloist awards at both a regional and national level. Hayley enjoys sharing her love of dance, appreciation for diverse opportunities in education and many years of experience with the students of Caliber Dance Company. Her goal is to guide her students on a path of excellence as well-rounded young artists, performers and people. At a community level, Hayley has choreographed for both GE Lighting and the United Way of Greater Cleveland's nationally recognized campaign kickoffs and anniversaries, is a member of both the Strongsville and North Royalton Chambers of Commerce and is a Meals on Wheels and Berea Animal Rescue volunteer. Hayley is certified in Cize Live fitness instruction, Acrobatic Arts (Module I & Professional Curriculum Aerial and Back Handspring Training), Alixa Flexibility (Modules I, II, III & IV) and Progressing Ballet Technique (PBT). She is also a certified AcroDance Pre-School Teacher through Acrobatic Arts. In November 2021, Hayley was elected as a member of the Strongsville City School Board.

Emily Sindyla

Competition Team Director, Instructor & Choreographer

Emily Sindyla has been dancing since she was three years old. She studied Jazz, Tap, Ballet, Pointe, Contemporary, Acrobatics, Hip Hop, Lyrical, and Musical Theater. As she continued to grow as a dancer, she competed and won Regional and National first place titles for solos and group numbers. She then began to teach, sharing her love for dance with others. After graduating from Strongsville High School in 2015, she attended Bowling Green State University, studying Dance and Business Administration. Emily had many performances for Bowling Green’s Performing Arts Program. She competed nationally with the BGSU Dance Team and was an avid member of University Dance Alliance (UDA). As a member of the Gamma Tau chapter of Delta Zeta, she held leadership roles through her four years in addition to choreographing for Greek Sing. In 2019, Emily graduated Magna Cum Laude from Bowling Green State University. Emily moved back to her hometown, starting her career at Equitable Advisors as well as teaching at Caliber Dance Company. In addition to teaching, Emily has choreographed for many local community theater productions including Hello Dolly, Frozen Kids, Seussical Kids, and Annie. Emily continues to support the performing arts by choreographing at Independence Community Theater and The Brecksville Theatre, where she began performing at the age of three. Emily’s work has been recognized with Overall High Score, Top Choreography, Most Entertaining, Most Crowd Pleasing, and Title Soloist awards. Emily puts her heart and soul into teaching her students at Caliber Dance Company. Caliber is her second home. She hopes to continue to encourage her students to be the best version of themselves, while teaching them how to grow and learn in and outside of the studio. Emily teaches Jazz, Lyrical, Contemporary, Musical Theater, Ballet, Tumbling and is the Competition Team Director for the High Caliber Competition Team.

Patience Collazo

Instructor

Patience Collazo is a dancer currently based in Columbus, Ohio studying dance at The Ohio State University. Patience has been dancing for over a decade, and has many experiences with diverse and esteemed dance teachers and professors over the years. She has studied many different techniques such as the Cunningham technique and the Alexander technique. She has choreographed for Ohio State’s dance club, Dance Connection, Brecksville-Broadview Heights High School dance team, and for many others. She has also won many awards for her dancing over the years including high point awards and judges choice awards.

Klay Fuentes

Instructor & Choreographer

Klay began his career in All-Star hip hop as a dancer in Pennsylvania. He has competed multiple times at the Dance Worlds Championship. This past year in May, he recently placed 7th in the World! As a teenager he was given the opportunity to dance back up for Lady Gaga at one of her Pittsburgh shows. He was a gymnast for 6 years and an All-Star cheerleader for 10+ years.
Klay has choreographed routines for numerous gyms and studios across the country, all of which have gone on to win various National Championship titles. He has an energetic and visual style to his dances, while always ensuring he’s patient and encouraging when teaching classes or new routines.

Kayla Hobson

Instructor & Choreographer

Kayla began dancing at the age of 3, and by the age of 8 began competing in a wide variety of dance styles. During her 10 years competing, she achieved numerous awards and scholarships; some of which include an AMDA college scholarship, the Velocity MVA scholarship, the NRG Electro Tapper scholarship, and the NRG Prodigy scholarship. While she was an NRG Prodigy, she traveled the country assisting the dance masters during conventions. Kayla has also trained with some of the most well known industry professionals including Twitch, Travis Wall, Kent Boyd, Tessandra Chavez, and Kyle Hanagami. Kayla attended the University of Cincinnati and graduated with a Bachelors Degree in Business Management. While in school, she worked full time as a dance instructor at a well known dance school in the greater Cincinnati area. During her time there, she received a number of choreography awards for her pieces. Since graduating from college, Kayla has been working as a nanny, as well as working independently with dancers and gymnasts, offering private lessons and solo choreography. Outside of dance, she loves spending time with her 5 little siblings, her many pets, and is in the process of starting up an online dog apparel business. Kayla is very excited to get back into the studio, sharing her passion and creativity for dance with the Caliber Family!

Colin Jacob

Instructor & Choreographer

Colin Jacob is originally from Cleveland, OH and graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in dance from Point Park University with a concentration in Ballet Technique. After training with Ballet West in Salt Lake City, UT, he went on to dance with Columbia City Ballet in Columbia, SC as a Demi-Soloist, and then with Ballet Virginia in Norfolk, VA as a Featured Artist. Now, he is a company dancer going into his second season with The Richmond Ballet. He has had the pleasure of dancing the works of Ma Cong, Jennifer Archibald, Val Caniparoli, Malcolm Burn, George Balanchine, Tom Mattingly, and Stoner Winslett.

Katya Kovalak

Instructor & Choreographer

Katya began dancing at the age of 3 and immediately found a passion for the sport. She started her dance journey with ballet and tap; and after joining her first competition team when she was 10, Katya fell in love with the stage. Katya was one of the original team members of the High Caliber Competition Team when we opened our doors in 2014. Throughout her years dancing as a student at Caliber Dance Company, Katya won multiple awards; including title awards, overall awards, most entertaining awards and invitations to dance at national dance competitions around the country. Her last few years as dancer and student at Caliber Dance Company, she was honored to spread her love for dance to all of the young dancers at the studio, assisting in ballet, tap, jazz and acrobatics classes for the young dancers. After graduation, she was beyond excited to come back to join Caliber on the opposite side as a choreographer. Aside from the studio, Katya is a full-time college student at The University of Akron. She is also a D1 student athlete on The University of Akron Dance Team.

Rachel Leheney

Instructor & Choreographer

Rachel Leheney grew up dancing at the age of 2.5 years old. The past 19 years she has learned various styles of dance including jazz, hip hop, contemporary, lyrical, ballet, modern, pointe, tap & acrobatics. She has been to conventions including Hollywood Vibe, Velocity, Intrigue & Cle Grooves, to name a few. She has been to multiple dance events, New York City multiple summers (Broadway Dance Center) performed as a backup dancer in Hullabaloo fashion show, NFL draft performance, Pro football hall of fame fashion show, Cleveland Walls performance, multiple professional video projects, and several more amazing opportunities. Rachel currently dances professionally with Cleveland Dance Project Company since 2020 and Works for the Cleveland Guardians Strikers Entertainment Team. Throughout Rachel’s time on company she has gotten opportunities to perform in several CDP shows, multiple video projects, Israel festival, the gathering place, NFL draft, fashion shows, multiple photo shoots and so much more. Rachel has also taught various styles of dance to dancers ages 3 to adults and has also worked with the special needs adaptive program at Creative Movement Center over the past several years. Rachel specializes in teaching technique, conditioning, total body, stretch, tap, hip hop, contemporary, lyrical, jazz, preschool/school age combos, and running rehearsals for competitive teams. Rachel loves teaching and helping dancers become their best selves in and outside of the classroom! She is excited to continue teaching and training and being a part of Caliber!

Kathleen MacCutcheon

Instructor & Choreographer

Kathleen started dancing at the tender age of 3 at the Richland Academy of the Arts in Mansfield, Ohio. Throughout high school, Kathleen had the opportunity to perform and train with the Central Ohio Youth Ballet, Cincinnati Ballet and Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp. She also assisted teaching younger dancers and quickly realized her passion for teaching. Upon graduation, Kathleen received her BFA in Dance Performance at Wright State University where she had the opportunity to perform, choreograph, and hone her artistry. Kathleen also danced and trained with the Dayton Ballet and Radio City Rockettes. In addition to her technique and performance classes, Kathleen enjoyed pedagogy and taught children from the surrounding studios. Kathleen performed professionally in Los Angeles and Atlanta. Her credits include West Side Story, Jesus Christ Superstar, Funny Girl, International Pinup Darlings: The Satin Dollz, La Cenerentola with the Atlanta Opera, Home for the Holidays, and Cabaret. Along with performing Kathleen has a passion for choreographing and teaching. She was a faculty teacher with The Atlanta Dance Academy and Community School Director at Wayne Center for the Arts. Her choreography credits include Disenchanted!: A New Musical, Jesus Christ Superstar and was the dance captain for Cabaret. While at Wayne Center for the Arts, Kathleen successfully trained 3 dancers to compete in the Youth American Grand Prix ballet competition. Kathleen and her husband welcomed their first child in December of 2021.

Mary Kay Manning

Instructor & Choreographer

Mary Kay Manning, former owner of Mary Kay Manning Dance Studios for 30 years, is no stranger to the world of dance. Mary Kay has a wide background in her dance studies. Locally, Mary Kay’s training includes that of several well respected teachers, including Dee Hillier, Jerry Burr, Dennis Nahat, Pam Pabisco, Alex Martin and Dave and Shirley Morganstern. Mary Kay went on to continue her education as a Dance Major at Ohio University in Athens.

During the course of her career, Mary Kay never stopped her training and education in order to continue to stay fit, knowledgeable and current with the dance and fitness world! Through her 30 year journey as a dance studio owner, Mary Kay was a certified active member of Dance Masters of America. Her frequent trips to New York City and LA gave her the opportunity to study with world renown dance educators including Luigi, Frank Hatchett, Charles Kelly and Joe Tremaine.

Mary Kay’s extensive background in teaching, choreographing, producing and directing annual shows and shows throughout the year has helped to lead her students to many successful endeavors and careers! These include participation on professional dance teams, teaching professionally, dancing on cruise ships, and starting successful dance businesses themselves!

Mary Kay has been a resident of North Royalton for 43 years and active in the community through the North Royalton Chamber of Commerce, involvement with Home Day entertainment scheduling, and Pageant Emcee. She is currently teaching group exercise fitness classes at the YMCA in North Royalton, Ohio and gets to encourage a fit and healthy life style through her high energy, choreographed and fun fitness routines!

Mary Kay is thrilled to be back in the dance circuit and is excited to once again spread her joy, passion and love of dance in the dance studio arena!

Emily Tekulve

Instructor & Choreographer

Emily began dancing at a young age and has trained at various studios in the Cleveland-Akron area. She has trained in various styles of dance and has experience teaching recreational, competitive and professional levels. Emily is a graduate of Wittenberg University where she received her Bachelor of Arts in Dance, focusing her studies in choreography and dance notation. While at Wittenberg, she performed in a variety student, faculty, and guest pieces and was given the opportunity to choreography and stage many original works. Emily has had the privilege of working with numerous choreographers and performed original choreography from artists such as Sarah Hixon, Kristina Isabelle, and Dr. Ligia Pinheiro. Emily has had the opportunity to perform and submit choreography to the 2010 and 2012 American College Dance Festival adjudication conferences at Mercyhurst College and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In addition, she has also had the opportunity to study many degrees of dance notation and has performed Labanotation scores from “The Sleeping Beauty” with rights obtained from the Dance Notation Bureau in New York City. Emily’s choreography has received both regional and national recognition as well as top performance honors and titles. Additionally, Emily obtained her Masters of Science in Nutrition and Dietetics from Case Western Reserve University in 2019 with a focus on clinical nutrition and research. She has been a licensed Registered Dietitian Nutritionist with the State Medical Board of Ohio since 2019. She is currently practices as a clinical dietitian at the Cleveland VA Medical Center in Cleveland, OH.

Meet our staff & dance educators

teacher bios

​​Hayley Stovcik

Emily Sindyla

Patience Collazo

Klay Fuentes

Kayla Hobson

Colin Jacob

Katya Kovalak

Rachel Leheney

Kathleen MacCutcheon

Mary Kay Manning

Emily Tekulve

Hayley Stovcik