Jake Butter is a dancer and educator originally from North Jersey, currently residing in Brooklyn. At the age of six, he started his dance journey when his parents enrolled him in ballet classes at the New Jersey School of Ballet. He continued taking lessons at New Jersey Ballet until he entered high school when he began to train at the Ailey School. At Ailey, he studied the techniques of Horton, Limón, and Graham, as well as Flamenco and West African. During his time at New Jersey Ballet and the Ailey School, he complemented his dance training by exploring musical theater and attended summer programs at the PaperMill Playhouse Conservatory. He graduated from Vassar College in 2018, majoring in Psychology and minoring in Education. While at Vassar, he was an active participant in the dance department and studied under John Meehan and Miriam Mahdaviani. He contributed to Vassar’s dance community as a member of the dance troupes Vassar Repertory Dance Theater and the student run group FlyPeople, in which he both performed and choreographed. He has performed works by Kate Weare, Steve Rooks, and Leslie Sachs and was an invited dancer for Donald Byrd’s Workshop at Spectrum Dance Theater in Seattle. In addition to being a dancer, he is an academic tutor specializing in the subjects of English and Math.