Full-Time Dance Faculty
Dance Program Coordinator and Lecturer
Sarah Carey is passionate about dance, movement and people. Her belief in the transformative power of the arts is shaped by both her personal journey and professional experience. Originally from Rochester, New York, her multifaceted career in dance has encompassed roles as a performer, educator, director, choreographer and collaborator across the U.S. and abroad. In New York, she trained with distinguished companies and artists, including the Limón Dance Company, Alan Danielson, Risa Steinberg, Carla Maxwell, Sue Bernhard, Doug Varone and Dancers, PUSH Physical Theatre, Garth Fagan Dance and Bill Evans. Carey holds a B.F.A. in Dance from Belhaven University and an M.Ed. from Cleveland State University.
In Ohio, Carey has worked with Tri-C, Cleveland State University, Ohio Contemporary Ballet (formerly Verb Ballets), DANCECleveland, the Cleveland Metropolitan School District (CMSD), the American College Dance Festival, the Beck Center for the Arts and others. She joined Tri-C in 2009 as an adjunct dance faculty member and has advanced to her current role as a full-time lecturer and the coordinator of the College's Dance program. Carey is committed to creating opportunities for students to develop both as dancers and individuals, emphasizing hands-on experiences, skill development and professional networking. Notable projects include codirecting and choreographing an award-winning dance film featuring Tri-C students, faculty and local professionals, as well as directing The Mix, a live concert integrating dance and recording arts students with guest artists B-Boy Tony Fresh and DJ Young Guru. Carey has also facilitated partnerships with DANCECleveland and Tri-C Performing Arts to bring guest artists, master classes and workshops to Tri-C from leading companies, such as Pilobolus, the Paul Taylor Dance Company, the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company, PHILADANCO! and Camille A. Brown.
At Cleveland State University, Carey served as the assistant to the director of dance, a rehearsal director and an adjunct faculty member. As the rehearsal director for the CSU Dance Company, she was instrumental in bringing works by Antonio Brown, Teena Marie Custer, Amy Miller, Annie Morgan and others to the stage for annual performances at Playhouse Square. Carey also thrives behind the scenes in dance production roles, having served as an assistant stage manager and a backstage crew member for CSU Dance Concerts at Playhouse Square.
Carey is deeply grateful for Cleveland's vibrant dance community and enjoys supporting fellow dance artists. She taught company classes for the dancers of Ohio Contemporary Ballet and served as a teaching artist with DANCECleveland's Read to Learn...Dance to Move program, leading in-school sessions throughout the CMSD to promote both dance and literacy.
Her professional performance credits span a range of works by notable choreographers, including José Limón, Danielson, Varone, Miller, Larry Keigwin, Nicole Wolcott, Lynn Deering, Bill Wade, Sara Whale and more. As a young performer, she performed in the national tour production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, starring Sam Harris. Local performance highlights include TEDx@CSU with Deering, Playhouse Square's Dance Showcase, Opera Cleveland, Cleveland Public Theatre's DanceWorks and the Beck Center for the Arts.
Carey is also a graduate of Tri-C's Physical Therapist Assistant program and is a licensed PTA. She integrates her knowledge of anatomy and movement science into her teaching, offering a holistic approach to dance training that fosters students' physical and artistic development. Through her own experience with injury and the challenges of recovery, she recognizes the importance of educating others to prevent/recover from injury and prioritizes overall health (physical, mental and spiritual).
Carey is dedicated to furthering the lives of others through dance. She views movement as a precious gift and aims to inspire people to move, be curious, learn, create and connect!
Adjunct Dance Faculty
Madalyn “Madds” Antonette Lucier is a practitioner of multiple hip-hop and street dance genres, specializing in house dance. Beginning her dance journey at age 28, she trained in New York City for five years and has since returned to Cleveland to build with the community of her hometown. Lucier serves as a teacher, a 10K Elite performance team member and the associate director for the 10K Movement, a local platform for hip-hop and street dance, providing education, performances and events for the local and larger street dance community. Prior to dancing, she fell in love with hip-hop for its playfulness, social justice imperatives and storytelling power.
Lucier teaches hip-hop and street dance classes at Tri-C in addition to her work with 10k Movement and the Cleveland Cavaliers Scream Team. In the classroom, she challenges students to develop their technical skills, groove, musicality, body awareness and creativity. She also stresses the importance of the historical and cultural context behind the dance to allow for more authentic musical and individual expression to come forward.
Alyssa Wilmot, a dance professor and choreographer, has been dancing her entire life. The Cleveland native has trained in a wide variety of dance forms, music, theater and fitness and has been teaching for more than 20 years at the college level. Wilmot holds a B.A. in Philosophy, Dance and Political Science from the College of Wooster and an MFA in Dance Choreography and Performance from Mills College at Northeastern University in Oakland, California. She holds numerous Pilates and fitness certifications and has danced professionally in California, Philadelphia and New York, and, the highlight of her career, Jacob's Pillow. Wilmot has been an adjunct dance professor at Tri-C since 2011 and an adjunct faculty member/visiting artist in dance at numerous colleges and universities in Ohio and California. She loves sharing her passion for dance with the Tri-C community.
Sarah Morrison earned her B.A. in Theater Arts and Psychology and her M.A. in Psychology from Case Western Reserve University. She is an adjunct faculty member in Tri-C's Creative Arts department and the Psychology department at Baldwin Wallace University. In 1997, she began MorrisonDance with her Cleveland Public Theatre premiere, Leaping Into the Net, the world's first contemporary dance concert simultaneously broadcast online. Since then, she has led the company to become an integral part of Cleveland's arts community, always experimenting with using the beauty of dance to showcase alternative disciplines such as science, technology, nature and visual arts. She has cultivated partnerships with some of the area's most fascinating artists and scientific leaders, including projects with NASA and BrainMaster. Morrison has worked with research teams at the Cleveland Clinic Center for Brain Health and the Department of Psychological Sciences at CWRU, where she coauthored several scientific publications with the Perception Lab, and has been the director of research for Dance/USA since 2022.
Morrison has been honored with the OhioDance Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Advancement of the Dance Artform and is a recipient of the Ohio Arts Council's Individual Excellence Award. Her creativity has been supported by unsolicited funding from the Rauschenberg Foundation in New York City, Cleveland Public Theatre, Cuyahoga Arts and Culture, Ingenuity Cleveland, the Puffin Foundation, DANCE NOW NYC and the Cleveland Foundation. Her dances have been presented in New York, Georgia, Illinois, Michigan, Virginia, Pennsylvania and Florida and internationally in England, Italy and Mexico. Morrison's work with MorrisonDance has been included in the OhioDance Virtual Dance Collection®.
Kay Eichman received her early ballet training from Pat Leclercq in New Orleans. She later studied on full scholarships at the National Ballet of Washington, D.C., the National Ballet of Canada, the C.R.R. de Nice in France and the Joffrey Ballet Center in New York City. Eichman left the Joffrey II company to join the Cleveland Ballet under the directorship of Dennis Nahat and Ian Horvath in its inaugural season. A distinguished 15-year career ensued, including principal and soloist roles. She had the distinguished privilege to work professionally with Rudolf Nureyev, Agnes de Mille, Cynthia Gregory, Flemming Flindt, Anna Markard, Victoria Simon, Michael Ladd and José Limón. She danced in many traditional and contemporary works, including Theme and Variations, The Four Temperaments, Agon, Concerto Barocco, Serenade, Rodeo, Swan Lake, Romeo and Juliet and The Nutcracker. She also had the opportunity to perform at the prestigious Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland. Eichman spent one season in Germany as a principal guest artist with the Giessen Ballet.
Eichman has served on the faculties of the Minnesota Ballet, the University of Akron Dance Program and Dance Institute, and the Cleveland School of the Arts. She is currently the ballet mistress at the Tri-C Creative Arts Dance Academy and serves as an adjunct faculty member at the College. Eichman received the 2016-2017 School of American Ballet National Visiting Fellow. She was also awarded a Certificate of Appreciation for her commitment, consistent dedication and teaching excellence from Tri-C. She was named Outstanding Teacher by the University of Akron Dance Institute and received an Appreciation Award from the Cleveland School of the Arts. Her work with preprofessional dancers has helped more than 30 students gain professional work. In addition to teaching and choreographing, Eichman teaches company class for the Ohio Contemporary Ballet, where she has had the pleasure of setting her choreography. Eichman has served on the faculty of the IABD Conference and Festival and has taught at the Joffrey Ballet Summer Session. She has participated as a talent judge throughout the United States with Dance Caravan, Dance Explosion, Dynamite and others.
Teaching Interests: Classical ballet technique, teaching all ages (from young to professional), mentoring, discipline, respect, kindness and love
Professional Interests: Ballet, choreography, staging ballets, music, lighting, creative progress, collaborating with other choreographers, mentoring