A Linden High School Teacher has been named this year's Dance Teacher of the Year.
Barbara Jude (Greco) Brady – who was born and raised in Linden - has been a Physical Education, Health, and Dance teacher in Linden for the past 18 years.
She graduated from Kean College of NJ in 1995 with a BA in Health and Physical Education and received her Masters Degree from Marygrove College in 2010. She also attended the Nathan Weiss Graduate School at Kean University where she received her Supervisor’s Certification in 2014.
Currently, Barbara is the Health and Physical Education Department Chairperson at Linden High School and is also the Dance Director.
Before teaching, Barbara was a professional dancer who has been on replacement for the Broadway shows Cats and Jerome Robbins’ Broadway and has performed with the NJ Ballet Company, Joffrey Ballet (NYC), and the NJ State Opera. She also performed and choreographed for the Cumberland County Playhouse in Tennessee.
Barbara has produced, directed and/or choreographed over 70 shows and is the President and a Co-founder of Mystic Vision Players, a Union County based community Theater Company.
She is the Ballet Mistress for the Metuchen Dance Centre’s Teen Dance Company, “Dance Reflections”, and has also been a member of the MDC faculty for the past 6 years.
She sits on the Union County Cultural & Heritage Programs Advisory Board and is listed in Who’s Who in Entertainment and Who’s Who Among American High School Teachers.
A Papermill Playhouse Rising Star Award Nominee and the recipient of many NJ ACT (Achievement in Community Theater) Awards. Barbara received a medallion from Governor Whitman in 1995 for promoting culture in the state of New Jersey.
Barbara is currently the New Jersey Association for Health, Physical Education, Recreation, and Dance’s 2016 Dance Teacher of the Year.
In 2012 she was honored with her first NJAHPERD Dance Teacher of the Year award, followed by the Eastern District 2013 Dance Teacher of the Year award.
Barbara has been married for 15 years to Kevin Brady, Jr. (a Deputy Chief in the Linden Fire Department) and they have 3 beautiful children, Marisa, Giulia and Michael.
Photo: Linden Public Schools