Kalei Fowkes

Blue Room Educator

As many young girls do, Kalei Fowkes began ballet lessons as a toddler. For her, however, ballet did not turn into a short-term hobby but became instead an important and pervasive role in her development. She trained pre-professionally at acclaimed schools such as Milwaukee Ballet and American Repertory Ballet’s Princeton Ballet School as an adolescent and attended audition-only middle and high schools for the arts in her hometown of West Palm Beach, Florida. Although she decided to forgo ballet as a career professionally, the self-discipline, work ethic, and love for the arts it instilled in her is maintained in her everyday life. Kalei hopes to foster these qualities in children by bringing the art of movement into the classroom. More recently, she enjoys rock climbing – which sounds quite different from dance but is surprisingly similar in its demands!

In April of 2013 Kalei graduated with a B.A. in psychology from Flagler College, a small liberal arts college in Northeast Florida. In August of 2013, she joined The Nest Nursery School as an educator in the one and two year old classroom. The Nest has become her family, and she has discovered a joyful passion in the school community and the study of Reggio-inspired early childhood education. Kalei, currently a Multi-Age teacher, looks forward to many more years of learning, playing, and loving alongside the children, families, and educators at The Nest.