Karolina Holmstrom, from Parsippany, NJ, is a high school dance educator at Woodbridge High School in the Woodbridge Township Public School District, where she teaches a variety of movement styles and creative practices to grades 9-12. She graduated with her Ed.M. in Dance Education and NJDOE Certificate of Eligibility with Advanced Standing from Rutgers, Graduate School of Education in 2023. Karolina is the Executive Director of Mignolo Arts, a nonprofit arts organization and dance company based in Metuchen, NJ (Artistic Directors Charly and Eriel Santagado), where she specializes in grant writing and performs in the dance company’s repertory works and dance films. For the past six years, she has coached marching band and winter color guard at Parsippany Hills High School as their visual director and choreographer for both sports. Karolina is a yoga instructor who teaches private clients and weekly classes at Mignolo Arts Center and Washington Rock Dance in Warren Township, NJ. She completed full-time student teaching at Clifton High School under the mentorship of Caitlyn Barrows where she taught modern/contemporary, ballet, jazz, choreographic practices, improvisation, yoga, and anatomical studies for all abilities. While at CHS, she choreographed contemporary works for advanced and intermediate classes, and returned in the spring of 2023 as a guest teaching artist and choreographer.

          Karolina graduated Summa Cum Laude in 2019 from Rutgers Mason Gross School of the Arts with a BFA in dance performance and memberships with the National Honor Society for Dance Arts (NHSDA) and the National Dance Education Organization (NDEO). She served on the Mason Gross Student Governing Association as a department representative, Secretary, and President. She has worked with choreographers and artists such as Mark Morris, Ani Javian, Pam Tanowitz, Blair Ritchie, David Torres, Randy James, Netta Yerushalmy, and Cleo Mack and her choreographic works have been performed in student concerts at Rutgers and professional showcases across New Jersey and New York. In 2016, she received a 200-hour vinyasa yoga teaching certification through the Om Factory and Rutgers University partnership program. In high school, Karolina attended the Morris County School of Technology where she concentrated in dance and theater arts, under the direction of Ruth Clark, and was a national finalist of the NHSDA and NDEO Artistic Merit, Leadership and Academic Achievement Award. In addition to her high school dance training, she attended the Bates Dance Festival’s Young Dancers Workshop and the Rutgers Dance Conservatory.