Faculty

Artistic Director

 Ballet Instructor for Children's, Primary and Pre-professional Divisions

  Lacey, owner and Artist Director of Westmoreland Youth Ballet, is a native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She began her training with Pittsburgh Youth Ballet and the Ballet Academy of Pittsburgh. She spent summers performing with Joffrey Ballet School, Nashville Ballet, and Point Park University, studying under the tutelage of artists such as Patricia Wilde, Nilas Martins, Paul Vasterling, Ask la Cour, Robert Steele, Elizabeth Corbett and many more.  She grauated magna cum laude with a B.F.A. in Dance Performance and Choreography from Mercyhurst University under the direction of Tauna Hunter, and has performed principal and featured roles in works by Rick McCullough, Matthew Prescott, Hannah Baumgarten, Lesley Bories-Scalise, and Solveig Santillano. Other performance credits include George Balanchine’s Concerto Barocco, Walpurgisnacht, and soloist in Raymonda Variations as well as the Sugar Plum Fairy, Dew Drop Fairy, and Snow Queen in The Nutcracker, soloist in Le Corsaire, Flames of Paris and Don Quixote. In addition to performing as a recurring guest artist with Lake Erie Ballet, Lacey has choreographed for main stage productions with Dance Conservatory of Pittsburgh,The Westmoreland Ballet Company, Mercyhurst University, Seton-La Salle High School Theater Department and international venues. Lacey also trained in pedagogy, kinesiology, anatomy and injury prevention, and carries with her experience instructing in the Vaganova, Balanchine, and Bournonville techniques. 

Ballet Instructor for Primary and Pre-professional Divisions, Costume Mistress

Valerie, originally from Pittsburgh, PA, began her studies with Ecole de Ballet, a charter of The Royal Academy of Dance, earning honors in all of her examinations. She went on to study with the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre School and Point Park Conservatory. While training with PBT, she performed in Keith Martins' Nutcracker, George Balanchine's The Nutcracker, Petroushka, Much Ado About Nothing, Swan Lake, and Hansel and Gretel, among others. At the same time, Valerie studied and performed with the Tamburitzans, Slaviani and Nicholas Jordanoff Summer Ensemble. 

Valerie has been teaching classical ballet in the Greater-Pittesburgh area for over 30 years. She has choreographed for several events in the City of Pittsburgh, including the Mayor Bob O'Connor Memorial in 2007 and the annual Pittsburgh Irish Fsstival. Her choreographic works also include several original children's ballets such as Falling Stars, The Magic Toy Shop, and Celtic Suite. 

In addition to her classical dance credits, Valerie has spent the last 20 years as Seton-La Salle High School's spring musical director. She has directed, choreographed, and produced many titles including, but not limited to, Damn Yankees, Into the Woods, Godspell, Pippin, Copacobana, Jesus Christ Superstar, and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

Guest Faculty, Master Teacher

 Tauna is Professor Emeritus and retired Chair of Dance at Mercyhurst University (1994-2019). She began her dance training with Willam F. Christensen and continued at the University of Utah where she earned B.F.A. and M.F.A. degrees in ballet performance and choreography. She performed as a principal dancer with Ballet West and Dallas Ballet and appeared as a guest artist with Ballet Concerto, Colorado Ballet, David Taylor Dance Theatre, Northern Ballet Theatre (England), The Pavlova Celebration International Tour and numerous regional companies throughout the United States. During her affiliation with Ballet West, she worked under the guidance of Bruce Marks and Toni Lander and received critical acclaim as one of the company’s leading ballerinas. In 1982, she placed as a semi-finalist at the II International Competition in Jackson Mississippi. In 1985, she co-founded DANSOURCE, a national networking and information service that connected dancers and companies for over ten years. As its’ Managing Director, she was highlighted in “Megatrends 2000” and featured in “Success” Magazine as a trendsetter in the future of the arts. Ms. Hunter has appeared in all the major roles of the classical repertoire and has taught for companies, universities and private schools throughout the United States and in England, Canada and China. She has staged numerous full-length classical ballets and choreographed over twenty-five contemporary works. For 10 years she was a Guest Artist in Residence for the Interlochen Arts Academy summer dance program. She has been honored with the Chautauqua Artist Teacher Award, Erie Arts and Culture Life Time Achievement Award, the University of Utah Legacy Award and was highlighted in the July 2017 issue of Dance Teacher Magazine. She currently serves as Vice Chair of the Erie Arts and Culture board, where she also acts as chair for the Fund Development Committee. In addition, she also serves on the Advisory Boards of Ballet Concerto (TX) and Dance Now Miami! (FL). In the past she has served on the University of Utah Artistic Advisory Council, the National Association of Schools of Dance board and locally acted as artistic advisor to Lake Erie Ballet for eighteen years as well as serving as President and Chairman of the board for the Erie Dance Consortium (Erie, PA) from 2000-2010. Ms. Hunter has been married to Michael S. Gleason for 34 years and they have a 27-year-old daughter, Caitlin. When she is not teaching, coaching or staging ballets, she enjoys traveling with her family, gardening, golfing and spending the cold months in their peid à terre in Florida. As a breast cancer survivor, she actively supports breast cancer awareness. 

Photography by Rick Klein

Guest Faculty, Master Teacher

Lesley began her dance training in Flint, Michigan under the direction of Gayla Zukevich. At age 12, she was invited under full scholarship to attend the National Ballet of Canada in Toronto, Ontario Canada, and continued her various dance studies under scholarship with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet School, Interlochen Arts Academy, North Carolina School of the Arts, and the Chicago City Ballet School. Lesley was one of only six dancers chosen from across the U.S. to attend a summer intensive trained by the legendary Suzanne Farrell and Paul Mejia in New York. Her professional career consisted of dancing with Chicago City Ballet under the direction of Maria Tallchief and Paul Mejia, Ballet Chicago under the direction of Daniel Duell and the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre under the direction of Patricia Wilde and Terrence Orr. While dancing with Ballet Chicago, she was a soloist guest artist in Ruth Page of Chicago, The Nutcracker, directed by the late Larry Long. Lesley has performed numerous principal roles, some of which include George Balanchine’s Square Dance, Western Symphony, Jewels, Apollo, The Four Temperaments, The Nutcracker, Daniel Duell’s Hansel and Gretel, Marius Petipa’s The Sleeping Beauty, David Parson’s Hairy Night on Bald Mountain, and Lisa de Ribere’s Amazing Grace. Upon retiring from the stage, she has been a ballet educator for more than 20 years. Lesley has served on the teaching faculty of The Rock School of the Pennsylvania Ballet, Point Park University, New Castle Regional Dance, and Greater York Center for Dance Education. She had the privilege of fulfilling the role as lead adjudicator for Ballet Michigan’s production of The Nutcracker. Mrs. Bories-Scalise was formerly the Executive Artistic director of the Lake Erie Ballet School and Company where she choreographed an extensive repertoire of ballets and contemporary works including a full-length production of The Nutcracker. Her most recent venture is the creation of an online dance course, Virtual Ballet Academy, offering dance and conditioning education for all levels and ages. Lesley enjoys teaching private lessons and master classes locally and throughout the U.S. and is honored to be on the teaching faculty of the Mercyhurst University Dance Department since 2003. 

Guest Faculty

Anna is from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she trained at the Ballet Academy of Pittsburgh. During the summers, Anna continued her training at Boston Ballet, Texas Ballet Theater, and Ballet West and expanded her performance experience as an apprentice with the Charlotte Ballet at the Chautauqua summer program.

In 2018, Anna graduated from Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music with a Bachelor of Science in Ballet Performance and an Outside Field in Arts Management. During her time at Indiana University, Anna performed soloist and principal roles in George Balanchine’s Serenade, Divertimento No. 15, and La Source, as well as the principal role of Giselle and Bournonville’s Flower Festival In Genzano.

Anna danced with Ballet Arizona for the 2018-2019 season under the direction of Ib Andersen and had the opportunity to perform soloist roles such as Princess Florine and the Songbird Fairy in The Sleeping Beauty.

She joined Miami City Ballet under the direction of Lourdes Lopez as a corps de ballet dancer in 2019. Anna has since performed in George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker and Jewels along with Ratmansky’s Swan Lake and Jerome Robbins’ I’m Old Fashioned. 

Guest Faculty

Elaina, of Brookfield, Connecticut, graduated magna cum laude from Mercyhurst University with a B.A. in Dance and a B.A. in Pre-Nutrition Studies in May 2016. Under direction of dance chair Tauna Hunter, she performed works including Flower Festival in Genzano, Pas de Quatre, Bruce Marks’s La Fille Mal Gardée, contemporary choreography by Rick McCullough and Hannah Baumgarten, and the title role in Melissa Bobick’s production of Little Match Girl. She received additional training during summer programs at The Nutmeg Conservatory, Ballet Austin, and Tulsa Ballet. Elaina spent four years in Minnesota dancing professionally with St Paul Ballet and Ballet Co.Laboratory, where she worked with choreographers including Zoé Henrot, Joseph Morrissey, Peter Davison, and Kinsun Chan. Elaina is an American Ballet Theatre® Certified Teacher, who has successfully completed the ABT® Teacher Training Intensive in Pre-Primary through Level 3 of the ABT® National Training Curriculum. She is currently a resident dancer with Texture Contemporary Ballet. 

Guest Faculty

 Haylie, originally from Mt. Pleasant, PA, began her dance training with Laurel Youth Ballet of Greensburg. With the school, she performed leading roles including the title role in Cinderella, Lilac Fairy in The Sleeping Beauty, and Odile in Swan Lake. She was invited to perform with Texture Contemporary Ballet under Alan Obuzor for their 2013 New Years’ Opening Night production. Haylie then went on to earn a Bachelor of Arts in Dance at Mercyhurst University where she performed repertoire such as George Balanchine’s Concerto Barocco (First Violin), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Helena), The Dying Swan, and The Nutcracker (Sugar Plum Fairy) under the direction of Tauna Hunter. She also performed numerous soloist roles created by Melissa Bobick, Tauna Hunter, Michael Gleason, Jon Lehrer, and Rick McCullough. While at Mercyhurst, she also performed with SoMar Danceworks under the direction of Mark and Solveig Santillano, Lake Erie Ballet Theater under direction of Lesley Bories-Scalise, and Cleveland Ballet Conservatory under direction of Kerry Skuderin. In 2014, Haylie competed at the Youth American Grand Prix Finals in New York City. She choreographed works for the Mercyhurst Dance Outreach Team which were performed throughout the Erie region. Upon graduating, Haylie attended medical school at Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine in Erie, PA and is joining the UPMC Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation residency program Class of 2025. Her goal is to continue training young dancers with a focus on proper musculoskeletal utilization and injury prevention.