Get to know Dancewave

At Dancewave, we think about dance as a vehicle for personal and communal transformation. We believe in youth empowerment, whole-person development, and a community-oriented dance experience accessible to all. Dancewave promotes a culture model that strives to subvert oppressive systems ingrained throughout the dance community and world at large.

get to know dancewave

Dancewave Culture Model - Informing all of our Initiatives

Our Culture Model is grounded in restorative practices and social-emotional learning (SEL). We help students better understand themselves in relation to others and larger systems by teaching participatory learning, decision-making, empathy, and self-expression through dance.

SCHOOL AT DANCEWAVE

Ages 3 - 18

We promote positive youth development through our year-round creative movement & technique classes, summer camps & intensives, and advocacy & service-based Youth Leadership Council.

PRE-PROFESSIONAL COMPANY

Ages 7 - 18

The Dancewave Company Program builds technical ability, artistic integrity, and leadership skills. Invited youth have the opportunity to work with world-renowned choreographers in our socially conscious program.

COLLEGE AND CAREER PREP

Ages 16 - 18

Our annual career preparatory and college fair event, Dancewave Through College and Beyond, is designed to facilitate student success in higher education and careers in the arts.

COMMUNITY INITIATIVES

Ages 3 - 103

Our signature arts education program provides high-quality dance programs to NYC schools, community centers, and senior centers. We also offer FREE all-ages community classes through our program Moving Together.

ARTIST SERVICES

Ages 18+

Engage a supportive community through our studio rentals and Class Share Program which connects adult class takers with local teaching artists.

CONTINUED EDUCATION

Ages 18+

Our Arts Educator Training develops and refines the skills necessary for inclusive, responsive, and developmentally appropriate teaching methods.

DANCEWAVE HISTORY

Having celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2020, Dancewave reflects on its humble start in a small office at the YWCA on Atlantic Avenue, its persistence shaping the dance education field in Brooklyn, and the 35,000 students, teachers, artists, parents and audience members it has touched through its innovative programming.

1995 - 2023 & BEYOND

Our Commitment to Being an Anti-Racist Organization

Dancewave acknowledges the historical inequities of our field and the responsibility of nonprofit arts organizations like ours to serve as catalysts for change. Over the past several years, we have engaged in racial equity processes; unpacking and addressing institutional and interpersonal connections with systems of oppression. We meet bi-weekly as a staff to strategize and implement change across all sectors of our organization, both internally and externally.

Through dialog, transparency, research, and critical analysis, we strive to hold ourselves accountable to our staff, community members, and stakeholders. We recognize our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion as an evolving process and openly engage in this work with the aim of embodying the deep systemic change we want to see reflected in our world at large.

We believe that liberatory, empowering education is a key component to building a more just society, and as such prioritize community building, restorative practices, cultural responsiveness and trauma-informed teaching across our programming.