Coogan has been working internationally as a dance artist, educator and scholar for over forty years. She has performed, choreographed and taught at numerous national and state theatres, for independent companies, professional training programs, at festivals, university dance and theatre programs, for community dance and in private schools.

From 1982-1995 Coogan was the artistic director of the Munich-based ensemble Coogan Dancers, whose productions were presented both in Munich and throughout Europe and in the USA. Since 1995 Coogan has been on the faculty of the Palucca University of Dance Dresden; since 2004 as Professor for Contemporary Dance. Her practice-based research investigates the building of community and artistic expressivity at the interface of the Feldenkrais Method and Contemporary Dance for both pre-professional and amateur dancers alike.

She has presented her doctoral thesis and research with dance ensemble ArtRose e.V. at numerous symposia nationally and internationally and has published in peer reviewed journals. She is the editor and principle author of the publication "Practicing Dance: A Somatic Orientation", German edition: "Tanz praktizieren, ein somatisch orientierter Ansatz" (2016, Logos Verlag Berlin). 

Coogan earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree from the Juilliard School in New York in 1981, studied Laban Bartenieff Movement Analysis at New York State University at Brockport and was awarded the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) from Coventry University (UK), Centre of Dance Research in 2021. Since 2001 she has been a certified practitioner of the Feldenkrais Method© and works with this method both in professional environments and in private praxis. Coogan is a founding member of the “Tanzkunst und Alter Initiative” and is an active member of the Gesellschaft für Tanzforschung e.V., the Feldenkrais Verband Deutschland e.V., EuroLab e.V. and Aktiontanz e.V.