​STEPHANIE WONCHALA​
Founder, Executive Director & Principal Choreographer

Stephanie Wonchala is an Anchorage choreographer, dancer and dance educator. Wonchala serves as the Executive Director of Pulse Dance Company and is the owner/operator of Studio Pulse Center for Dance, selected as a "Best of Alaska" studio in 2017 & 2018. She is a 2017 Connie Boochever Fellow, a 2016 Alaska Journal of Commerce "Top Forty under 40" awardee and a 2015 Rasmuson Fellow.
 

Wonchala served as Artistic Director of the 2014 Arctic Winter Games and on faculty with UAA's department of Theatre & Dance. She has produced and directed numerous community dance events, including nine evening-length concerts for Pulse Dance Company, choreographed for the Anchorage Concert Association and Cyrano's Theatre, and been commissioned by the Anchorage Symphony, the Alaska State Council on the Arts, the Anchorage Museum Polar Lab Initiative, and the University of Alaska Anchorage. Her work has earned highest rankings in the NUVO dance convention. 
 

Wonchala is a UAA dance ensemble alumna and has trained in acclaimed studios in New York, Vancouver, Long Beach, and Berlin, as well as attended multiple American College Dance Festivals across the U.S. She has interned, instructed, performed and choreographed for dance intensives in Homer, Seward, and the Fairbanks Summer Arts Festival. She has studied under Jake Casey, Bobbi Jene Smith, Chaim Gebber, Manuel Vignoulle, Mia Michaels, Graciela Kozak, former XSIGHT! director Brian Jeffery, Billy Siegenfeld of the Jump Rhythm Jazz Project, Katherine Kramer of Rhythm Explosion, Peter Carpenter, Annie Arnoult-Bessera of Striding Lion, Alice Bassler Sullivan, Krenly Guzman, Lillian Manansala, and Ines Moroni.

She has held the titles of Miss Anchorage 2005, Miss Chugiak/Eagle River 2006, Miss Alaska 2006, and competed in the Miss America 2007 pageant on Country Music Television. Wonchala was featured in the Anchorage Press as one of Anchorage's most accomplished personalities in 2012. In addition to 15 years as a dance educator, she is certified in Yoga Sculpt, Buti Yoga, Barre Pilates and Zumba.

Wonchala is incredibly grateful to live a life in dance - especially in Alaska. She continues to be inspired by the beautiful hearts, minds and bodies that make up Pulse Dance Company, and feels deeply privileged to work with them every day.