Alex Tecza (MFA 2025) is a former elite professional ballroom dancer, winner of over thirty championship titles, most notably World Professional Rising Star American Smooth Championship (2008), World Masters Professional American Smooth Runner-Up (2009), US National Open Professional American Smooth Championship finalist (2009), World Professional Open American Smooth Championship finalist (2009), Dancers Cup Tour Professional Couple of the Year Award (2008 and 2009), North American Same Sex American Smooth and American Rhythm Championship (2019). Alex holds the fellow level of teaching certification in ballroom from US Terpsichore Association. He is currently an Adjunct Professor of Dance at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and Illinois Wesleyan University. He is also a certified teacher of the Alexander Technique (m.AmSAT), and maintains a private teaching practice in Champaign, IL, and Chicago’s northwest suburbs. 

Alex believes in providing his students with a strong technical foundation while encouraging every dancer to achieve mastery of their body as a means for personal expression. His approach to teaching is grounded in conveying the basic principles of partnering: clarity and elasticity of physical connection, listening, musicality, and efficiency of movement. Alex has been recognized for excellence in academic teaching by repeatedly being included in the List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent by Their Students.

As a choreographer, Alex investigates breaking down traditional gender roles in ballroom dancing, with specific interest in developing an equal partnership style, where roles of lead and follow disappear altogether. Aside from his own works, he has choreographed dance concert pieces for the School of Theatre Arts at Illinois Wesleyan University and several productions for the Lyric Theatre at Illinois, including Die Fledermaus, Black Square, Anastasia, and Carnaval! (2024-2027).