Skip to content

Teaching Staff

All teaching staff are fully qualified and CRB checked.

Principal:
Laura Gillingham AISTD Dip. (MD) (ISB) (ND)

A former pupil of the school under Linda Shipton, Laura attended the highly acclaimed Laine Theatre Arts. After graduating Laura then returned to her native Suffolk and joined the teaching staff at Linda Shipton. Teaching with Linda the school went from strength to strength and has for many years, enjoyed a fantastic reputation both locally and nationally for producing students who consistently achieve excellent results in examinations and successfully audition for prestigious schools. Laura has also been a guest teacher at a number of schools locally. Over the years Laura took on more responsibilities until she took over the school in 2012 having worked continually with Linda for over 28 years. She is proud to have been instrumental in the training of all the current staff.

Sarah Scannell B Ed Dance (Hons), AISTD (ISB) (MD) (ND) (CB)
Sarah began dancing at the Linda Shipton School of Dance and was a Suffolk ballet scholar for 7 years. She went on to graduate from London College of Dance with a BA Hon’s degree. Sarah achieved a distinction in all of her ISTD teaching exams and is now an associate in Imperial Ballet, Cecchetti Ballet, Modern Theatre and National Dance. Sarah has 15 years experience teaching in dance schools, private nurseries, public schools, and choreographing for many shows and festivals.

Lucy Abbott BA (Hons) LRAD

Lucy trained at the Linda Shipton School of Dance from the age of 6 and achieved distinction at intermediate level across all genres. Whilst attending the Linda Shipton School of Dance Lucy attended the Suffolk Ballet Scholars program and the ISTD ballet awards. 
Upon completing A Levels she went on to train at the Royal Academy of Dance where she completed the BA(Hons) degree in Ballet Education and the Licentiate of the Royal Academy of Dance. Whilst studying at the RAD Lucy gained valuable teaching experiences in a variety of settings around London. Lucy currently lives and teaches ballet and non syllabus jazz classes in London and enjoys teaching at the Linda Shipton School of Dancing whenever she can!