Connecting Children with Their Community

Kerrie is more than a seasoned performer, educator, and choreographer; she's a creative powerhouse with a lifetime of experience infusing art with heart. She holds a BFA in Theatre Arts along with a lifelong commitment to learning. Kerrie founded Forevermore Dance & Theatre Arts—a vibrant hub celebrating 20 years of empowering individuals through the arts. At Forevermore, Where "Art has Heart" isn't just a tagline but a teaching philosophy, Kerrie passionately mentors her dream team, children and teens, cultivating leadership skills and leaving a lasting legacy of inspiration.

Beyond her studio, Kerrie is a proud member of More Than Just Great Dancing, advocating for the profound impact of arts education on young lives. Her career includes 24 years of studio ownership, national touring and teaching residencies, captivating audiences, and conducting workshops that ignite creativity in diverse communities.

Kerrie's journey spans the full spectrum of theatrical artistry—from glittering stages to intimate productions. She's graced these spaces as a dancer, actress, and versatile production professional, seamlessly blending performance with behind-the-scenes in many facets including: lighting design, stage management, directing, and producing.
Offstage, Kerrie finds joy in the everyday adventure of motherhood to two incredible teens, accompanied by a lively entourage of two cats and an awesome shepherd/husky mix. She unwinds with yoga, immerses herself in nature, captures moments through writing and photography, and relishes quality time filled with laughter and shared learning among like-minded friends.

Through her extensive work teaching children, adults, and underserved communities—including underprivileged youth and inmates—Kerrie remains a tireless advocate for the arts as a potent vehicle for empowerment and social change. The arts have a remarkable ability to bring people together, fostering connection and understanding. By creating spaces where individuals feel seen, heard, and valued, the arts have the power to transform lives and change the world.

Caroline graduated from Columbia College Chicago with a double major in Dance and Business with a focus on Entrepreneurship in 2018. Beginning her dance career at the age of three in Italy, she has trained in numerous competing studios throughout the United States. Being the daughter of a father in the military, she was afforded the opportunity to travel to a surplus of studios around the globe. Said experiences have given her a unique perspective that combines teachings from dance instructors around the world. A few of the aforementioned recent instructors include, but are not limited to, Paige Cunningham, Darrell Jones, Carrie Hanson, and Krista Ellensohn. Some of her recent performances include dancing with Visceral Dance Company in their show, Within, in November 2021. She has also competed at World of Dance and Prelude in Chicago, performing with hip hop company BANG BANG! Additionally, she has danced with renowned hip hop company, BOOM CRACK, under the artistic direction of Trae Turner. Since she was young, Caroline has always known that she’s had a passion for empowering youth through the medium of teaching. Though she flourished in the role of ‘dancer’, nothing could compare to her blossoming into the roles of ‘teacher’ and ‘choreographer’. Moreover and having grown up in the world of dance, Caroline has witnessed a surplus of teaching styles as a student, colleague, and lead facilitator; with this exposure, she’s embarked on a journey towards understanding how kids learn cognitively, and particularly how the body learns and adapts to movement through dance.

Magdalena Naruszewicz is a graduate of Columbia College Chicago with a BFA in Dance. Throughout her career, she has trained in a multitude of styles including Modern, Contemporary, Ballet, West African, Improvisation, and Dance Composition. While at Columbia, Magdalena performed in works such as Silent Disturbance by Julia Zic and incomplete, and had the honor of working with choreographers including Jennifer Kayle, C. Kamal Nance, Darrell Jones, and Paige Cunningham.

Her performance experience also includes dance films such as I Try by Kayla Kurns, as well as her own directed works, isolation and Brace. She has choreographed and performed a duet titled internal and a group piece titled Who Do We Go To?. She currently dances professionally with Meraki Dance Company, directed by Kristen Baron, where she has performed in multiple works and created her own choreographic piece for the company, Hands That Couldn’t Heal.

Magdalena is currently a Dance Teacher at Trinity High School and teaches ballet, modern, contemporary, and jazz at Forevermore Dance & Theatre Arts, where she is beginning her 7th year. In addition to teaching, she contributes to Forevermore’s administrative team.

Konnie Kakridas, a Chicago native, discovered her passion for dance early while training here at Forevermore Dance & Theatre Arts! She recently graduated from Columbia College Chicago, earning her BFA in Dance in May of this past year. Known for her narrative artistry, she has studied under esteemed mentors and trained in Ballet, Modern, Hip-Hop, Tap, West African, Umfundalai, and more. Konnie has performed at Harvest and Delve Dance Festivals and recently showcased her choreography on Columbia's Dance Center stage. Passionate about Teaching, she works with both children and seniors and interned with South Chicago Dance Theatre, working in their Josephine Co Gen internship and Susan Imus’s Dance for Health internship, striving to make dance inclusive, impactful, and accessible within the Chicago dance community.

Bryanna Ciera Colón is an alumni of Forevermore and is so happy to return as staff again this year. She started her training at the studio in 2007 up until her high school graduation in 2021. However she started teaching and choreographing at the age of 16.
Bryanna’s career started off at the age of 4 when she started professionally acting and modeling. From that, her love for the performing arts blossomed. She continued intensive training at Forevermore in the dance program, the ensemble, and the theater program known as “The Theatre Bugs”. She grew up doing commercials, prints, magazines. Then in high school and adulthood, short films, television, and theater. Some of her credits include episodes in the critically acclaimed NBC TV series Chicago Fire (Seasons 8-11) and the FOX TV series The Big Leap. 

Bryanna made her national tour debut in the hit holiday musical The Elf On The Shelf: A Christmas Musical (Ella: Mills Entertainment). Other theater credits, In The Heights (Yolanda, Nina u/s, Ensemble: Arts Center of Coastal Carolina). Alma (Angel: American Blues Theater). A Chorus Line (Vickie, Diana u/s: Drury Lane Theater). The Art of Bowing (Farah: Haven Chicago). 

Bryanna can’t wait to share her passion with the students of Forevermore and hopes to inspire them as her time at Forevermore did for her!

Ms. Kateri is excited to join Forevermore this season to teach acting and musical theatre! Ms. Kateri fell in love with theatre while playing Tinkerbell in the school play when she was in 5th grade. She continued her studies of performance at the Chicago High School for the Arts, Wilbur Wright College, and Loyola University Chicago. Ms. Kateri has been a teaching artist for the ChiArts Summer Camp, Adventure Stage, and Storycatchers Theatre. Since 2021, she toured nationally with Griffin Theatre in their productions of The Stinky Cheeseman and Other Fairly Stupid Tales, Innovation Nation Live!, and Frindle. Ms. Kateri is delighted to be more involved in the Forevermore community, beyond attending her younger sisters’ dance and theatre performances over the years, and is very excited to inspire creativity and confidence on the stage!

David received his BA in Theatre from Wagner College (NYC) and has been a dedicated Arts Educator for more than 20 years - directing, teaching, and performing with groups of all ages. During this time, he has served as the Co-Founder of Forevermore Dance & Theatre Arts, Director of Theatre at Rootz, and Artistic Associate/Actor with Face to Face Productions. He has performed and directed with many local theatres including Overshadowed Theatrical Productions, Wheaton Drama, St. James Theatre, Williams Street Rep, Mad Props, The Riverfront Playhouse, Theater for Charity, and the Kaneland Arts Initiative.

Adele has been a part of the Forevermore family for almost 18 years! She started at the studio when she was 2 years old, taking classes from Ms. Kerrie in all different styles ranging from ballet to tap. Adele joined the Senior Dance Ensemble in high school with her friends where she danced competitively for 3 years until she graduated. She has trained in all the different dance styles at the studio including ballet, pointe, jazz and more. Adele has worked with and learned so much from everyone on staff at Forevermore and has found so much joy teaching the early childhood classes! She recently performed in her first show after graduating in a piece choreographed with her former teacher, Ginger Jensen, with Glenwood Dance Studio. She is currently studying sociology and criminology at Dominican University and is excited to continue pursuing both her academic and dance career!

Kayla, a Michigan native, began her dance training at the age of three. Before college, Kayla trained at Spotlight Dance Works located in Chesterfield, MI under the direction of Liz Schmidt. During her time at Spotlight she learned and performed works from Travis Wall, Lauren Adams, Adam McGaw and Brooke Pierotti.

After completing high school, Kayla knew she wanted to pursue dance as a career. Kayla graduated from Columbia College Chicago with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance & Choreography. While at Columbia, she trained with and performed works by esteemed artists such as Paige Cunningham, Jeff Hancock, Carrie Hanson, Darrell Jones, and Allen Desterhaft. Her original choreography was also presented on the Columbia stage on multiple occasions.

In addition to her college studies, Kayla completed a two-year certificate program with Hubbard Street Dance Chicago’s Professional Training Program (HS Pro), directed by Alexandra Wells. Her training encompassed ballet, contemporary, modern, repertoire, Gaga, and Image Tech. She also had the opportunity to work with a range of renowned artists, including Peter Chu, Elia Mrak, Robyn Mineko Williams, Rena Butler, and FLOCK (Florian Lochner & Alice Klock), among others. Kayla also had the opportunity to perform works by Peter Chu, sharing the stage with Hubbard Street Dance Chicago’s main company in Space in Perspective. She was also featured in their winter series, Dance Evolve, performing pieces choreographed by Rena Butler and Florian Lochner.

Now, Kayla is grateful to be part of the Forevermore team and looks forward to creating a supportive space where students can grow, learn, and explore their love for dance.

Bella Colon is a sophomore at Dominican University studying biology with a premed track. Her goal is to become an OBGYN. Bella has been an avid member of the Forevermore family along side sister and staff member, Bryanna Colón, since 2007 through her graduation in 2022. While at Forevermore she was an ensemble and theatre bugs member. When not at the studio working or at school studying, she loves to play the piano and listen to music. Bella does administrative work here at Forevermore and is thankful for the opportunity to continue her lifelong relationship with this amazing studio.

Allison Bystron was born and raised in Chicago where she is a private lesson and music teacher in the city. She attended Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music in Bloomington, Indiana where she graduated with a degree in Choral Music Education, and two minors in General Music Education and Psychology. Allison started playing piano at the early age of 3 years old, and started singing shortly after. Having gone to Chicago High School for the Arts as a vocalist, Allison has been classically trained in voice since she was 14 years old. In high school and college, she continued to take voice and piano lessons, and was involved in many different ensembles.

Allison now teaches high school concert choir at her alma mater, ChiArts, and has covered a variety of classes including “Vocal Jazz & Contemporary Techniques”, “Wind Ensemble”,”Bass Technique for String Players”, “Keyboard Skills I” and “Keyboard Skills II”. As a music educator in Chicago, Allison has served as a traveling music teacher to daycares around Chicago to students ranging from 6 months old to 6 years old, as well as being stationed at an elementary school teaching Pre-K through 8th grade general music. Now as a high school choir teacher stationed at one school, she provides private voice lessons to her students at ChiArts, and has the pleasure of teaching voice and piano lessons to her Forevermore students.

Most recently, Allison co-music directed “Matilda, Jr.” at Forevermore’s two week summer musical camp where she worked closely with the students at Forevermore, the staff, and with the Forevermore community as a whole. She is excited to continue working with her Forevermore students this fall, and hopes to meet many more students and community members in the following months!

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Frances Messina was born and raised on the Northwest Side of Chicago and has always had a genuine love for the arts. She graduated Summa Cum Laude from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville with a Bachelor’s in Political Science and later returned to earn her Master of Public Administration.

Frances’ love of the arts really grew from her passion for music and concertgoing, and that joy is something she hopes to share with others. As the Community Outreach Coordinator at Forevermore, she connects with local businesses, families, and community groups to help support the studio, the dancers, and the community. She’s dedicated to building meaningful relationships that support the arts and bring the community together.

When she’s not working, Frances enjoys going to concerts, traveling, hanging out with friends, and taking long walks!

Jaylinne Ramirez, born and raised in Chicago, IL, began her dance training at Forevermore Dance and Theatre Arts. She also trained at the Joffrey Ballet and graduated from The Chicago High School for the Arts in 2022. She recently just finished her year at The CLI Conservatory in Southampton, Massachusetts under the mentorship of Teddy Forance. She is trained in Ballet, Jazz, Hip Hop, Modern, Spanish Dance, Pointe, Lyrical, and Contemporary. She has performed the works of Kenichi Kasamatsu, Marlee Hightower, Liana Blackburn, Christopher Wheeldon, and many others. Jaylinne hopes to pursue her career working as a commercial dancer in L.A. As well as teaching and sharing her love for dance.

Hello, my name is Michael Cepela and I am a passionate Music Educator in the city of Chicago. I am a trained choral conductor specializing in piano and voice, and have performed in University Opera productions such as the chamber opera The Masque of Angels by Dominick Argento. I played piano repertoire anywhere from Bach’s Preludes and Fugues to Impressionist pieces of Debussy and Ravel. In my free time, I have composed and produced short music scores for a few local Chicagoland artists.

Hi! I’m Camryn and I love to sing! My focuses include: opera, musical theatre, and jazz. I just moved to Chicago to pursue my masters in vocal performance at DePaul University. I’m super excited to join Forevermore this year to teach voice and musical theatre! I love combining singing and acting to create a memorable performance and can’t wait to teach here in Chicago!

Hello! My name is Mr. Joe, and I love to make music and help others discover the joy of it too. I perform and teach guitar, piano, voice, and percussion, and also enjoy teaching composition, songwriting, and music appreciation. I'm excited to explore what makes musical creativity fun for you this year!