Meet The Staff

Artistic Director/ Owner

Paola Rarick

Artistic Director/ Owner

Paola Rarick was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina. She was exposed to art at an early age from her father who was a writer and renowned director in Argentina. She began her dance training at the age of 6. She has extensive training in Ballet, Tap, Musical Theater and Lyrical dance. Paola danced competitively for 9 years throughout the country. She was a member of nationally recognized and award winning dance companies. She continued her dance training at Broadway Dance Center in NYC. Besides running her dance studio, Paola is also choreographer for Shoreline Theater Company, Artful Living Productions and Branford High School Performing Arts. She loves to bring the joy of dance into theater production. Some of Paola’s theater production choreography credits include: Hairspray, Mary Poppins, The Little Mermaid, The Addams Family, The Producers, Little Shop of Horrors and most recently, Anything Goes. Paola has a bachelor’s degree in corporate communications. She resides in Branford with her husband, Bill and daughter, Bella.

Claire St. John

Claire started her journey at County Ballet Dance Studio in Bel Air, MD at the age of 6. Her training encompassed many varieties of dance with a focus in classical ballet. Her early performance experiences were as a soloist with Part Two Dance Company for 4 years, danced with Moscow Ballet in The Great Russian Nutcracker for 3 consecutive show seasons, and performed in the ballet Giselle with L’Etoile Russian Ballet Academy alongside ABT soloists Veronika Part and Vitali Krauchenka. She also studied at The Nutmeg Dance Conservatory back in 2014, in the pre professional summer program.

In 2017, she graduated from the Baltimore School for the Arts where she trained under Norma Pera, Barry Hughson, Deborah Wingert, and Demitri Malikov of Bolshoi Ballet. During her time there she performed in their annual nutcracker and multiple works from the Balanchine trust such as, Who Cares? and A Russian Serenade.

After graduation she attended Shenandoah University as a BFA in Dance where she trained under Shylo Martinez, Maurice Fraga and Tiffanie Carson. During her time at SU she was the captain of collage dance team, The Doah Dolls.

Claire is currently working towards her bachelor’s degree in Marketing and Small business management, teaching at Studio One Dance Center as well as a few other studios across Connecticut.

Claire St. John

Cheryl Russo

Cheryl Russo began her dance training at The Dancer's Studio in CT , moving onward to pursue a B.A. in Dance Performance from Roger Williams University in Bristol, Rhode Island. Throughout her training at RWU, she studied under the direction of Kelli Wicke Davis, David Dorfman, France Hunter, and Gary Shore. She was an active dancer in the Roger Williams Dance Theatre where she worked exclusively with master artists not limited to Michael Bolger, Sean Curran, Cathy Nicoli, Jenny Rocha, and Melody Ruffin Ward. Throughout her dance career, Cheryl has been extremely grateful to receive numerous prestigious honors and national awards such as the Christina Richmond Award, a multiple Dance Masters of America title holder, and representing the U.S.A to receive two Gold Medals in the National Tap Dance Festival Championship taking place in Portoroz, Slovenia. Today Cheryl resides in Guilford, CT with her family, where she continues to share her love and knowledge of dance and physical fitness throughout the Tri-State area.

Nicole Siley

Nicole Siley is a 28 year old dancer. She has been dancing since three years old and continues to keep this passion a large part of her life. She attended Coupe Theatre Studio through her young and adolescent years, where she was trained in ballet, tap, jazz, contemporary, and hip hop. In High school Nicole performed with and captained her school’s Varsity Dance Team; she attended Quinnipiac University where she performed, choreographed, captained, and competed with their hip hop team, Dance Fusion. Nicole has taught dance in a variety of settings such as summer camps, performance teams, private lessons, musicals, and competition teams. Nicole loves the freedom and connection dance creates individually and as a collective. She is excited to bring her passion, joy, and energy to Studio ONE!

Nicole Siley

Sophia Coppola

Sophia is ecstatic to be a new addition to the incredible staff at StudioOne! She's been dancing since the age of 4 and loves to perform any chance she gets. Sophia is currently pursuing her bachelor's degree at Southern CT State University. Sophia also serves as choreographer for the Branford Parks and Rec. Shoreline Theatre Company's Summer Theatre Camp. She has studied voice for many years and will be playing the role of Roxie in Chicago in Shoreline Theatre Company's production of Chicago this summer. She is thrilled to continue her journey on the StudioOne Staff!

Allie

Allie has been dancing for 15 years and teaching for 5. Allie has trained with Sandee & Linda Juliano, Raymond Lagdamen, Twitch, and Spirit All Stars. A former competitive dancer in Jazz, Tap, Lyrical, Hip Hop, and Acro, Allie garnered many awards. In High School competitive dance team, Allie had many accolades. At the conclusion of her competitive dance career, Allie pursued her dream of teaching to share her passion of Acro with her students. Her students over the years have grown as dancers learning new skills and winning many awards.