After spending more than half her life in association with the American Dance Festival School, Donna Faye Burchfield has decided to move on. At the conclusion of the 2010 season in July, she left ADF to accept a position as director of the University of the Arts School of Dance in Philadelphia.

Burchfield first joined American Dance Festival in 1982 as a student and became part of the staff two years later. As dean since 2000, she has overseen all of ADF’s educational offerings. In addition to structuring the school’s curriculum, she created the MFA, post-baccalaureate and combined BA/BFA program in collaboration with Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia.

“ADF continues to be this transformative place for me, so this step is a big leap of faith,” says Burchfield. “My biggest accomplishment was making sure that students know that dance matters every single day. By creating new relationships at the University of the Arts, I will hopefully find out things about this artform that I never thought of.”

Photo courtesy of ADF