Jawole Willa Jo Zollar earned her B.A. in dance from the University of Missouri at Kansas City and her M.F.A. in dance from Florida State University. In 1984 Jawole founded Urban Bush Women (UBW) as a performance ensemble dedicated to exploring the use of cultural expression as a catalyst for social change. She is the founder of the UBW Summer Leadership Institute, founding Artistic Director and Chief Visioning Partner of UBW and currently holds the position of the Nancy Smith Fichter Professor of Dance and Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor at Florida State University. Jawole has received numerous honors including the Doris Duke Performing Artist Award and the 2017 Bessie Lifetime Achievement in Dance. In 2020, The Ford Foundation awarded Urban Bush Women as one of America’s Cultural Treasures, and Jawole has recently been named a 2021 MacArthur Fellow. Joined 2022

‍

PHOTO: Crush Boone