Roots & Remedies 2022
Bend & Flow: a Sensual Stretch Experience
Dr. Kristen is a performance artist, scholar, educator, fitness instructor and coach, entrepreneur, and mother. Dr. Kristen has been an explorer of the arts and movement since childhood. She has a background in visual arts, dance, gymnastics, and cheerleading. It was not until high school that Dr. Kristen discovered her natural affinity to psychology. Dr. Kristen is a south Florida native and graduate of The University of Central Florida (B.S. in Psychology) and The University of Miami (M.S.Ed in Community and Social Change). Dr. Kristen also has a PhD in Applied Social and Community Psychology from North Carolina State University.
Along her doctoral journey, Dr. Kristen experienced high levels of stress related to feeling isolated, disconnected from Spirit, as well as racial and gender-based oppressions. Dr. Kristen needed an escape and she found that in the pole community. She reflected on her childhood passions of art and movement and longed for an activity that would allow her to revive these parts of herself. Pole fitness and dance offered a space for Dr. Kristen to reconnect with her full self again. Additionally, her doctoral training in community psychology allowed her to see that pole is a tool for coping with adversity and creating self.
Dr. Kristen integrates her expertise in psychology with her training as an ACE and XPERT certified pole fitness instructor to guide her clients and students along a journey of self exploration and liberation through pole fitness and dance. Dr. Kristen has coined her work Polecology®.