San Jose / California / United States
About the San Jose Ballet School The San Jose Ballet School was founded by Wana Williams Kalimos of the San Francisco Ballet. The school was directed by Wana Williams from 1949 to 1959. Then Francesca and Dimitri Romanoff of American Ballet Theatre co-directed the school until 1980. Janet Vertin assumed the role of director in 1980. Janet Vertin, the current Director of the San Jose Ballet School, is the third generation of dance teachers in her family. The first was her great aunt, Marion Belle White, a graduate of the Imperial School in London, and director of her own school in San Francisco. The second family member was her mother, Helen Pabst Walsh, a graduate of College of Notre Dame Belmont, and now Janet Vertin, who is a graduate of Santa Clara University. Janet Vertin received her training from Wana Williams, who was a "classically perfect" dancer and teacher. While with Wana, Janet danced in a number of educational films and appeared with the San Jose Light Opera. She then went on to train in the San Francisco Ballet School and studied all teaching syllabi with Guillermo del Oro. She later studied in Europe where she was invited to dance with the Opera Ballet at the Pfalz Theater in Kaiserslautern, Germany. She also studied in Canada at the Banff School of Fine Arts with Vera Volkova for four summers. Janet has been teaching at the San Jose Ballet School since 1980. She coaches both ballet dancers and figure skaters. Her students range from age 10 to age 80, and they all come from different walks of life.
