See Beautiful Grant Recipient: Carolina Dance Collaborative

The feature below is brought to you by Carolina Dance Collaborative, an organization that is in the running to receive a See Beautiful Grant. For more information about our giving initiatives, please click here.​ 
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To learn more about the featured organization, please visit their website here.

The Carolina Dance Collaborative is a mobile dance outreach organization with an extensive dance education curriculum that incorporates individual creativity, healthy living, and developing life-skills to reach all populations and demographics in Greenville County and the Upstate of South Carolina. We see beautiful each and every day when we have the privilege of working with children in underserved communities, senior citizens, disability organizations, schools, and community centers. We travel to their space and help participants develop healthy life-skills that will impact them beyond the dance classroom and into their everyday lives.

CDC is making the Upstate of South Carolina more beautiful through giving all people access to dance education regardless of location, ability, and resources. Dance is an art form that uses the beauty of the body and movement to communicate with both the soul and the outside world. We believe that every individual should experience and embody the life changing power of dance. Each student's background, their body shape & color, creativity, and their personalities are to be celebrated. We value collaboration, empowerment, and equity in our classrooms and believe that each individual has value and importance in the class at large.

Our programs range from working with small pre-schoolers to older adults. Each program differs from the other in terms of length of time, curriculum, location, and population served. One of the main barriers for parents we experience every day is the cost of programming. Parents are simply unable to provide enrichment, possibly life changing enrichment, due to the financial strain even for a low cost program. Equity for the Carolina Dance Collaborative is making sure that all dancers have access to our program no matter their circumstances. We raise funds, apply for grants and build relationships with families to support their needs.

One program we have worked with since 2017 is a good example of that. Wheatley Montessori School is a neighborhood preschool program that is specifically located within an affordable housing neighborhood and directly seeks to serve that neighborhood. Sixty percent of their students receive state vouchers and the school's owners also provide scholarships to deserving students. The Montessori Method is of special importance in closing the achievement gap that exists between low-income and minority students and their majority peers. 

Through creative movement and a variety of other dance styles like African, Ballet, Jazz, and Hip-Hop, dance helps students make concrete and abstract connections with their body, classroom learning and the world. Our ongoing partnership with Wheatley has allowed us to see many students through their pre-school years into elementary school. We have had the joy to watch their moving, creative selves grow and see their beauty unfold. In recent years our partnership was significantly affected by the pandemic. Prior to 2020 we asked parents to pay a reduced tuition and offered financial assistance when necessary.  In the fall of 2020 the director knew these parents would not be able to pay even a small amount for the dance enrichment these students loved and looked forward to. It was at this point that our organization started looking for full funding for this specific program and many others that had been significantly affected by the pandemic. Each and every one of these students are beautiful in their own way and they love to dance. Their life circumstances should not overshadow opportunities offered to them and our partnership strives for just that.

We see beautiful in how these under-resourced students are impacted through developing them as creative learners. The project aims to connect learning and creativity in order to promote physical and social emotional wellbeing for the students involved and their families.

Beautiful is in every moment with our students. Beautiful is the self-esteem we see grow within and emanate out to the world. Beautiful is the creativity of our students shared with their classmates. Beautiful is the joy on anyone's face when they get to move freely without judgment and with purpose. Beautiful is any group of people with a shared purpose to promote wellbeing no matter how young!

Submitted by: Alyson R Dixon