Jennifer Devereaux Ellington, Camp Director, is a proud co-founder of 888 Monkeys SAP. She graduated from Santa Clara University with a BA in Theatre Arts and English. Jennifer has performed, directed and designed with several Bay Area Theatre groups including West Valley Light Opera, Saratoga Drama Group, Theatreworks and Studio Theatre of California. Most recently, she finished playing Kathy Stapleton in an extended run of Hound of the Baskervillles with Santa Clara Players. Contemporaneously, she was rehearsing and performing the role of Mrs. Beauregarde in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with Tabard Theatre Company. She is a founding member of Walking Sideways Theatre Company and teaches and directs the Theatre program at Bret Harte Middle School in San José Unified School District.

Carlo Gentile, Program Administration, has been teaching circus arts to children and adults since 1994. He has performed with Circus Flora and toured with the Royal Lichtenstein Circus as a clown, juggler, unicyclist and diabolo artist. Carlo is a charter member of the American Youth Circus Organization.

Singing and dancing since age 3, Orlene Gentile started her work as an educator by teaching Filipino folk dance in 1990. She cut her teeth as a variety entertainer on the streets of India, Vietnam and the back woods of Thailand. She has taught circus, gymnastics and dance since 1999. She is President and Festival Co-Director of the American Youth Circus Organization.

Together, Orlene & Carlo have been teaching and directing circus programs for the past nine years. In 2002, Carlo and Orlene founded Fool Time Circus, an ensemble of teachers/performing artists dedicated to building confidence and expanding life choices through recreational circus arts. Both are graduates of Santa Clara University and the San Francisco Circus Center's Clown Conservatory. But, it took multiple trips to China for the perfection of their foot juggling number. [photos | video | blog] Since creating that act, they’ve toured the Midwestern and Eastern USA on the Zoppé Family Circus in 2004. More recently, they performed with Switzerland's Circus Monti.

Cynthia ‘Aviance’ Rauschert is a professional stilt-walker, contact juggler and entertainer from New York City currently living in San Francisco, California. After six years working primarily as a walk-around entertainer and circus skills instructor at various private, corporate and community events on the east coast, she was accepted into the flagship “EPI/CC” program, a collaboration between the SF Clown Conservatory and the New College of California’s Experimental Performance Institute. In August 2007 Cynthia was one of the first four to ever receive an accredited degree in Clowning in the United States. After graduation she toured with Cirque du Soleil on the Saltimbanco Bus and is now performing locally in the Bay Area. When not performing Cynthia operates CynRa Media, a small private graphic design company “for artists by artists” and co-produces CircusNYC.com. Her mission is to spread joy and wonder and she is determined to change the world one smile at a time.

Jennifer Sargent has worked for the last eight years as a teacher and theater director for adults and children of all ages. She has performed her own physical theater and clown work in six countries across Europe and North America. She teaches with Circus Minimus and Gymstars in New York and recently taught theater workshops at Oberlin College and for the Sweet Can Circus of San Francisco. She completed her professional theater training at École Jacques Lecoq in Paris, France and holds a BA from Oberlin College.

Joshua Palkki is a native of Ishpeming, Michigan who identifies very closely with Garrison Keillor's tales of Lake Wobegon. A graduate of Ball State University (Muncie, Indiana), he graduated cum laude with a B.S. in vocal/general music education. He has performed throughout the United States and Europe with the BSU Chamber Choir and the SJSU Choraliers and has worked on/performed in numerous musicals, operettas, and operas as performer, vocal director, and vocal coach.

Josh is employed by San Jose Unified School District, where he teaches choral music at Hoover Middle School and Lincoln High School. He currently serves as assistant conductor of The Choral Project.