Dancing Over 30

Nicole Williams is a Detroit-born dance teaching artist whose movement practice carries the living memory of the city that shaped her. Raised in an entertainment family performing Motown medleys at state fairs and corporate showcases, her foundation deepened through the West African and Afro Cuban dance traditions woven throughout Detroit's communities. That early immersion - alongside formative influences like Janet Jackson and The Fly Girls - gave shape to a movement dialect she continues to refine today.

Formal training in ballet, commercial jazz, hip-hop, and tap led Nicole to Western Michigan University, where she earned dual Bachelor of Arts degrees in Dance Performance and Communication Studies. She returned to Detroit for eleven years of teaching, performing, and directing at Motor City Dance Factory, while dancing with companies including Ballet Edge Detroit, White Werx, A Company of Dancers, and Intertwine Dance Collective.

Nicole currently serves as Dance Teacher, Company Director, Dorm Head, and Affinity Group Faculty Advisor at Northfield Mount Hermon School in western Massachusetts. She holds a Master of Arts in Teaching Artistry from Wayne State University, where her research centers on embodied storytelling as a radical tool for critical education. A recipient of the Northfield Mount Hermon Excellence in Teaching Faculty Fellowship as well as the Academic Program Faculty Fellowship, she earned her International Dunham Technique Certification in 2026 following four consecutive years of study.

Nicole approaches Dunham Technique as a living inheritance - one she carries forward with intention, scholarship, and deep love for the communities her art serves.