Faculty and Staff

Led by Artistic Director, Mia Whitehead, our best-in-class instructors deliver the finest instruction in San Antonio. Mia and her team of professional ballet instructors have taught dance around the world and across the country. Their perspective reaches beyond our community, inspiring our students to succeed in the studio, on stage, and in life.

Mia Whitehead
Artistic Director

Mia Whitehead began dancing under her mother, Melvina Whitehead, and at Ballet Magnificat! School of the Arts. She completed Belhaven University’s Dance Apprentice Program, receiving extensive training under Lauri Worrill-Biggs and Laura Morton. While at Belhaven, she received scholarships to Joffrey Ballet School, Nashville Ballet, and Dance Theatre of Harlem. Miss Whitehead danced professionally with Ballet San Antonio and Talk Dance Company, expanding on her dance horizons not only by performing, but also by teaching at the national and international level. Miss Whitehead values the lives of her students and seeks to provide an environment for them to learn and develop their discovered and undiscovered gifts. Mia Whitehead joined the Ballet Conservatory of South Texas as the Artistic Director in June of 2022.

Jessica Ramm Terry
Associate Artistic Director | Social Media Manager

Originally from Seabrook, Texas, Jessica Ramm trained at The Houston Ballet Academy for six years before completing her training with the Texas Ballet Theater. She completed training programs hosted by Boston Ballet, Milwaukee Ballet, Bolshoi Ballet Theater, Oklahoma City Ballet, and Ballet Austin. Her professional experience includes Coastal City Ballet located in Canada, Oklahoma City Ballet, Ballet Austin, Alabama Ballet, and Ballet San Antonio. As a member of these companies, she has performed in popular ballets such as The Nutcracker, Romeo and Juliet, Les Sylphides, Cinderella, Coppelia, Giselle, George Balanchine’s Rubies in addition to a variety of other classical and contemporary works. After leaving Ballet San Antonio, Jessica became a principal guest artist around Texas performing various lead roles such as Sugar Plum Fairy, Snow Queen, Bluebird pas de deux, Moszkowski Waltz and contemporary works. With Jessica’s performance experience, she is an established choreographer who has choreographed contemporary works on ballet companies such as the Alabama Ballet and Ballet San Antonio. She has also choreographed virtually on dancers around the world. In addition to performing and choreographing, Jessica has been teaching ballet and modern at the Ballet Conservatory since 2018.

Rachel McCalla
Lower School Principal

Ms. McCalla began her ballet training at the age of 6 with Sandra Bravo at the Performing Arts School of Classical Ballet in San Antonio, Texas. At the age of 15, Ms. McCalla expanded her dance training and joined Stellar Gymnastics in Kerrville. Ms. McCalla coached Mommy and Me classes as well as numerous other gymnastic and dance levels. In 2012, Ms. McCalla began teaching for Sandra Bravo at Bravo! Ballet School in the heart of Castle Hills. During this time, Ms. McCalla had the pleasure of working with and training under Mrs. Katia Garza, former principal dancer of the Orlando Ballet. Ms. McCalla enjoys spending her free time with her husband in the beautiful Texas Hill Country that she calls home.

Alexandria (Dria) Ballew
Company Rehearsal Assistant

Dria Ballew began her dance training at the age of three in San Antonio, Texas at Dorothy Keck Dancers. She then transferred to Ballet New Braunfels followed by Ballet Conservatory of South Texas. While at Ballet Conservatory, she danced with Ballet San Antonio and trained in master classes under Joffrey Ballet. While working toward her BA from Texas State University in English and Anthropology, she trained in Austin in floor barre technique and with Austin Community Ballet. She continued her ballet education at Steps on Broadway in NYC and graduated with her MA in Modern & Contemporary Art in 2020. She returned to San Antonio in 2021, and since then, she has taught Classical Ballet, Modern, Jazz, Tap, and Conditioning.

She is so excited to be returning to BCSTX, the studio she has always considered to be home, and share her passion for ballet with future generations.

Dede Barfield
Instructor

Born in Ft. Worth, Texas, Ms. Barfield began her training in Ft. Worth with Gayle Corkery and continued at the Etgen Atkinson School in Dallas. At the age of 14, she began studying during the summers at the School of American Ballet in New York City and by the age of 16, she move there to study exclusively. Ms. Barfield joined the Pennsylvania Ballet in 1984, was promoted to Soloist in 1987 and to Principal in 1990. Her repertoire includes a wide variety of classical roles including Odette/Odile in Swan Lake, Myrtha in Giselle, Vera in Robert Weiss’ full-length production of Winter Dreams, Les Sylphides, the title role in Ben Stevenson’s Cinderella and Juliet in John Cranko’s Romeo and Juliet. On June 12, 2004, she gave her last performance as a professional dancer as her favorite role of Odette/Odile in Christopher Whealdon’s Swan Lake. Since leaving the Pennsylvania Ballet, Ms. Barfield has been busy teaching at Bryn Mawr College, The Performance Garage at Jeanne Ruddy Dance, The South Jersey Ballet School and with the Pennsylvania Ballet’s Outreach Program. She has been a guest teacher for the Chamberlain Ballet in Plano, Texas, the Country Day School in Ft. Worth, the Brandywine Ballet and the Dance Theater of Pennsylvania. Ms. Barfield also taught ballet classes at the University of Las Vegas during the 2007 Spring semester. In addition to Ms. Barfield’s extensive ballet training and experience, she has studied Pilates since 1979 and in recent years completed a 2-year advanced teacher training seminar with her mentor of 20 years, Karen Carlson. She is certified in all apparatuses and mat. She has been with the Ballet Conservatory since 2007.

Micaela Morris
Instructor

Micaela Morris received her early dance training with Georgia Academy of Dance and Georgia Dance Theater in Peachtree City, Georgia. Following high school, she attended Belhaven University and now holds a BFA degree in dance. Throughout her collegiate training, she had many performance opportunities with classical, modern, and contemporary pieces and focused her education on ballet pedagogy, teaching methods, and kinesiology. After graduation in 2018, Micaela performed as a company member with the Montgomery Ballet. Her favorite rolls while performing in Montgomery include Spanish in The Nutcracker, the Sylph Pas in Graduation Ball, and Fish in Carnival of the Animals. Micaela also loves musical theater and has most recently appeared as Brenda in Hairspray and in the ensemble in The Music Man. In 2019, Micaela and her husband moved to San Antonio to be Artist in Residence with San Antonio Metropolitan Ballet. With SAMET, Micaela performed the Spun Sugar pas de deux in Hansel and Gretel, the Lady of Summer in The Snow Queen. She also performed in Dominic Walsh’s Sucumbir. Most recently, Micaela appeared in Ballet Conservatory of South Texas’ performance of La Boutique Fantasque as the Shopkeeper’s Wife. Since arriving to San Antonio in 2019, Micaela has had many opportunities to teach in San Antonio and loves teaching dancers of all ages. Micaela began teaching at Ballet Conservatory in 2021 and looks forward to continuing to educate young dancers for years to come!

Magen Sevilla
Instructor

Originally from Corpus Christi, Texas, Magen Sevilla relocated to San Antonio for graduate school in 2014. Ms. Sevilla joined The Ballet Conservatory of South Texas in 2022 as a certified Pilates instructor. In addition to her successful career as a health and fitness instructor, she is also the owner of Bloom + Stem, a full service online floral business that she started in 2019.

Buse Babadag
Instructor

Buse Babadag was born in Istanbul, Turkey. She started her training at Istanbul University State Conservatory with Christopher Paluch at age 10. After 5 years of intensive training with him, she got accepted to Munich Ballet Academy in Germany. She was trained with Vaganova technique by the world known former ballet stars at Munich Ballet Academy. She got to perform at Heinz Bosl Stiftung Matinee with Bayerisches Staats Ballet’s Junior Company. She graduated from Munich Ballet Academy with a Bachelor’s Degree in Dance. She was chosen to perform Kirill Melnikov’s Cinderella pas de deux at Biennalle Dance Education 2014/Dresden Gala at Semperoper Dresden. Same year, she was invited to perform Romeo and Juliet Balcony Pas de Deux at the galas in Rome, Pisa, Toscana and Cairo. In 2014, she moved to America and started working with Tulsa Ballet II. After performing a season with Tulsa Ballet, she got offer as a company member with Dance Alive National Ballet in Florida. In her third season with the company, she got promoted to a Soloist. In 2018, she was offered to join to Indianapolis Ballet, where she mostly danced Balanchine Ballets as Serenade, Rubies, Who Cares, Wals-Fantaisie, Four Temperaments, Raymonda Variations, and Allegro Brilliant. After 3 seasons of performing with Indianapolis Ballet, she was offered a Soloist contract with Ballet San Antonio and already performed Sugar plum fairy in Nutcracker and Kitri’s Friends with the company in 2022. Her repertoire includes some of William Forsythe works, Balanchine and Bournoville technique. Ms. Babadag joined the faculty at BCSTX in Fall 2023.