Jessica Trivizas ’16 has been a ballet dancer since she was 3. While she continued to dance at local studios in Memphis after coming to Rhodes, she also chose an English major, took education classes, and pursued her interest in nonprofit work. As it turns out, all of these interests converged her senior year with an internship at New Ballet Ensemble.
The nonprofit ballet school holds classes in elementary schools and also provides scholarships to classes in their studio in the Cooper-Young area.
As the education and marketing intern, Trivizas markets shows held each fall and spring at the Cannon Center for the Performing Arts. She also helps pair up mentors from the community with dancers in the program and works with events for the mentees, including ACT/SAT study prep days and college fairs.
“A couple of students I met reminded me a lot of myself when I was in high school,” she says. “I connected with them well and was able to explain how dance was a part of my college career, but that I did not study dance in college.”
Interacting with the students has helped prepare her to teach English abroad next year and possibly become an educator in Memphis afterward—that or pursue a graduate degree in marketing.
“The internship has allowed me to grow to love PR and communications,” she says. “I have also always wanted to be a teacher, so it’s helped me to see maybe I can do both.”