SUMMARY
My teaching philosophy is built on seeing each child’s individual spark and meeting them where they are with enthusiasm, creativity, care, and intention. It is grounded in belonging, cultural understanding, and the belief that every child can grow into their fullest, most fearless artistic self.
SSDL DEVELOPMENT MODELTM
My teaching follows a simple rhythm: See, Support, Develop, Launch. This is the heart of my SSDL Development ModelTM: “See-2-LaunchTM,” a developmental teaching framework I created to train students in the Arts and help them rise from being seen to being fully prepared, whole-human artists, both technically and artistically.
I begin by seeing each student in front of me, then creating a world where their artistry can grow without inhibition. I believe in every student. Whether talent is immediately visible or not, there’s always a reason why each student wants to train at a conservatory. My role is to unearth that reason, nurture it, and help it soar. That said, I challenge MYSELF to imagine the potential each student carries long before they can see it in themselves. I show them what’s possible, then build the pathway that leads them toward it–step by step, skill by skill –until the moment they realize they can do it themselves, and they can do it FEARLESSLY.
CREATING A SAFE SPACE
I begin by cultivating a safe, joyful space where students feel welcomed, supported, and ready to learn. From there, I focus on developing them with the strongest training I can offer: clear technique, mastery of rhythm patterns, cultural and historical grounding, creative exploration, and the resilience to grow through repetition and refinement. Finally, I aim to “launch” students with the tools they need for their next steps, whether in academia and/or a professional dance career. That includes creating opportunities, building pathways, and maintaining relationship pipelines with Arts institutions and theatrical agencies that may help my students move confidently into the world as young artists.
“WHACK-A-MOLE” RESILIENCE
A core part of my teaching is building resilience. I train my students to develop a “whack-a-mole” personality –the ability to pop back up every time something knocks them down; often joking that I am the “Queen Whack-A-Mole”. I teach them to enjoy making mistakes, to use mistakes, and to embrace refinement as part of the artistic process.
I want students to build a high tolerance for correction and rejection, and to rethink feedback as a form of “creative collaboration” or use an exploratory tool. Oftentimes our best feedback manifests in transformative ways, becoming our internal motto we carry, as artists, for a lifetime! That said, when students learn to welcome critique with excitement rather than fear, they unlock their power. They become artists who are fearless, adaptable, and capable of sustained excellence.
REPETITION IS KEY
When it comes to technique, I teach my students that repetition builds consistency–not luck— and that a high level of consistency is what allows a dancer to perform at professional industry standard. Repetition refines their technique and strengthens the body to control their speed and execution while consciously designing their artistry with seamless effort and efficiency characteristic of trained professional dancers.
GROUNDED IN LINEAGE
My pedagogy is grounded in lineage. I believe students should understand where movement comes from–its history, its people, and its purpose. This grounding deepens artistry and builds empathy. It also teaches students that dance is a living tradition shaped by many cultures, European, Latin American, Asian, Native American, and my specialty the African Diaspora, all of which is foundational to American dance.
COMMUNITY P.I.E.TM
Across my arts-in-education and institutional engagement work for grades K-12, I use a broader framework I call Community P.I.E.: Community, Performance, Incubation and Innovation, and Education. This framework ensures that students FEEL LIKE THEY BELONG and connect tangibly to the work. More importantly, it creates the “permission slip” to play, create, and try new ideas, shine onstage in meaningful ways, and learn through educational practices that connect their training to culture, history, and community!
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, I teach because I deeply believe that young people deserve spaces where they can enjoy a profound sense of belonging, play freely, and dance with uninhibited joy while learning in a rigorous training environment. With this vision at the center, my ultimate goal is to launch students into the world as confident, connected, and creatively courageous human beings.
