Melissa Hayden Endowed Scholarship

Scholarship benefitting promising high school students studying in the School of Dance.

Established by Susana Lannik and Mark Gorstein in 2001. Melissa Hayden was a Prima Ballerina and UNCSA Faculty Member. Melissa danced for 28 years and taught for 23 years. She was a native of Toronto, and studies with Boris Volkoff at the age of 15 and by 20 she was dancing in the corps de ballet at Radio City Music Hall in New York City, all the while studying at George Balanchine’s School of American Baller under Oboukhoff and Vladimiroff. In 1945 she joined American Ballet Theatre and in less than a year, she was a soloist, performing with the company in the States and abroad for two-and-a-half years. There followed an extended tour of Cuba and South America with Alicia Alonso’s company. In 1949, George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein invited her to join their newly formed company, the New York City Ballet. For the next 24 years, except for a two-year return to American Ballet Theatre, Melissa Hayden was a leading ballerina of this world-famous company. Melissa’s final season with the New York City Ballet in 1973 was a personal and artistic triumph. Following her retirement from the stage, she spent three years as artist-in-residence and director of ballet at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. She then created Melissa Hayden Inc., a dance studio in Manhattan where intermediate and advanced students and young professionals from across the country had the chance to study with one of America’s most distinguished ballerinas. In 1983, Melissa came to the School of Dance at the (University of) North Carolina School of the Arts in Winston-Salem, where she firmly established her reputation as a master teacher while continuing her active career as a visiting artist throughout the world. Many honors have been awarded to her including the School of American Ballet Artistic Achievement Award, the Dance Magazine Award, the Mademoiselle Magazine Award, the Dance Educators Award, the Albert Einstein Award, and the 0. Max Gardner Award for teaching excellence from the University of North Carolina Board of Governors. She held honorary degrees from Skidmore College, Siena College and the University of Western Ontario. She served on the Board of Trustees of Brandeis University.