Lake Country School of Dance opened in 2000, and the first few years we held classes out of a single classroom in the old Woodlake Elementary School. The studio was quite small with just me teaching about 70 students between the ages of 3 to 10. I knew (or thought!) my passion was teaching younger dancers, so I planned to stay as a junior studio (teenagers were too grumpy!!) and I had no interest in ever taking students to a dance competition! By 2003 we had moved with the local Boys and Girls Club to the old Winfield Elementary building which allowed us to grow to include more space and more teachers-- and we quickly had over 250 students (teens included!!) Slowly we EVEN began to venture into the competitive world! Vicki View joined our teaching staff 2011 and that is when the caliber of our competitive dancers began to really to change. Vicki’s technical teaching methods, her passion for clarity and detail and her amazing creative choreography really took our competitive team to a higher level. Vicki, along with the technical strength of our ballet department under the direction of Loretta Beamish-Lachner and countless stunning choreography pieces from some regular guest teachers such as Heather Dotto, LCSD began to advance as one of the top competitive studios in the Okanagan Valley and Western Canada. We are proud to provide our students with skills, benefits and opportunities that will be useful whether they pursue a dance career after high school or take an entirely different path. Our alumni have gone on to perform on the West End of London, work as dancers on Holland America Cruise lines as well as multiple professional and semi-professional Canadian dance companies.
Our recreational dance program has continued to thrive over the past 2 decades as well, and all our teachers love sharing their passion of dance with even our youngest students. My favourite thing is hiring dancers that have grown up at our studio and return as teachers, sharing their gifts with younger dancers. It makes my heart so happy to see the older generations of LCSD dancers giving back and continuing with our dance philosophies and teaching methods. I feel so blessed and grateful to have taught thousands of young dancers in our community over the last 23 years and I’m so excited to see where the upcoming years take us!
Thanks for coming along for the ride :)