Well, my mom works at Western, and my dad actually worked at Western as well and
so I kind of grew up with community theater and being in some musicals, so I
just really liked the campus so that was my main choice for college. I chose
Western because I just really didn't want to leave home. I grew up around here
my whole life and it's just kind of always been a part of the community and
my home was here. I just know I just didn't want to leave. Some of the student
organizations I was in, I was a part of University Dance Theater through the
dance department, and I really didn't do anything else - that was about it for me.
Um, organizations that I was a part of involved University Dance
Theater, through the dance department - being a broadcasting major you really
got to start doing things right off the bat when you got here like most schools
I've always I always heard that you have to wait a couple years before you get
hands-on and right away you know you're kind of allowed to be a part of things.
So we did a lot of sporting events, I also took pictures for athletics for a
couple years for football games and basketball games baseball games for
their athletic department that they use for promotional purposes. Well it was
actually, Bridgeway was one of my favorite pieces because everybody is just so
excited to learn a dance and it was kind of like a collaboration between the
Bridgeway residents and the University dancers, so it was it was definitely a
fun experience. Bridgeway is a place that provides like job opportunities for
those with disabilities and it gives them an opportunity to go out and work.
Being in the dance department, it kind of helped shape me, just to learn some more
dance backgrounds and dance techniques to help teach my students here in Macomb.
Then, going through kinesiology has shaped me to, I guess, really be aware of
the muscles and the bones that are being used through dance and helps with
injuries, injury prevention, so that really helps being in a dance studio and
being around tons of kids. I had many professors here that influenced me. One
of them specifically was Sam Edsall. He was really hands-on with video and I
used a lot of that technique that I learned here to do a lot of promotional
advertising for our studio and our business through either you know
videography or taking photos. I honestly don't think I would have
learned how to use any of it if it wasn't for the classes here. We were
given our dance studio before we graduated Western so I was in my...I just
finished my junior year - I was a sophomore - and I was getting ready to
start my senior year with internships and everything and our boss actually
decided to hand the studio over to us if we wanted it and we decided to, yeah, we
decided to open up Project Dance Company together and it's just grown ever since.
Yeah, we had a handful of kids that we, you know, there was like maybe five or
six at the time, and, you know, it's something we love to do and
basically, since we were in college, Project Dance Company has been a thing...so, yeah.
Well, like Lauren said, when we opened up Project Dance Company, we just
had maybe like a handful and we have some that are from Hamilton, Illinois as
well, and they come to Macomb almost every single day, and the surrounding areas too, like Bushnell, Good Hope,
Ipava, Table Grove...and every single year we just bring in more students.
Right now we're currently about 150 students so and we're on year six. Um, my
dad, since day one really, has been the one that's done all the renovating of
our studio. We needed more space in our waiting room so we needed to get...there
was a huge space of windows that just took up way too much room, so my dad and
a couple of the dance parents helped. My dad demoed the front lot, or the front
windows, and expanded our lobby. It's not quite done yet, but...the weather's been kind of...it'll get there.
We both stay connected to the University through, um, the theater and dance department.
We actually have been asked a few times to come in and be guest artists for some
of, like, the musical theater dance class or the jazz class that Heidi Clemmens and
Lisa Fox offer here on campus. I also come in and teach the tap class also
once or twice a semester as well, so we both do that. We like being involved in
the parade every year - it's the girls favorite parade, by far. It's long,
but it's, it's the girl's favorite parade because, everyone, it's like the one time, or
a couple of times a year, that the community comes together and they can
all celebrate Western and the alumni that have
come through and returned. Western gives many opportunities even though it is a
smaller community. It prepared me for what I'm doing now, even if it's not what
I steered towards at the beginning. I was born and raised in Macomb, and I'm such a
family person - I couldn't imagine going far away...me either...and my mom is
still here; she still works at Western and, um yeah, it's, it's just home. I couldn't
imagine being anywhere else. Yeah, we do, or we like being involved with things
and, um, the kids really help as well, it's, we live in a really rural, small
community, but the experiences that I know we've given a lot of our students
and the children for the area, will help prepare them for their future and it has
brought them many opportunities to succeed and to better themselves at a
very young age. So, we take a lot of pride in knowing that we can provide that for
them. The ages we accept are from age 2 until about 18. We offer a whole
different variety of classes. We offer tap, ballet, jazz, lyrical, tumbling, hip-hop...
I even teach Zumba classes for adults, so we definitely offer quite a variety there.
We've kept basically kind of the same classes since day one. We have what
we call tiny tots for our 2-year-olds, and then combo classes for our 3- to
6-ish-year-olds. It's kind of like a it's a combo between tap and ballet. At
that age they don't really they don't really know what they like and don't
know what they want yet, until they reach around 6 and they kind of branch off
to the individual classes that are half hour, 45 minutes, or an hour.
But yeah, it's just, this is kind of a structure for any dance studio and yeah
throughout the years we've added more because we have gotten bigger and the
bigger you get the more levels of kids that you get, so we have added that.
We've been asked to come in to Lincoln School for Adopt a Classroom, so we are
currently working with Mrs. Thompson's class in first grade, so we stopped in
there a few times and we teach all of her students some dance skills and some
dance combos. Kimmy is also really involved in the Bomber Dance Team at
Macomb High. She, for the past couple of years, or three years maybe, she
choreographs their dance team routine and works with them, voluntarily, because
we have a lot of our older, all, or most of our high school dancers are on the Bomber
Dance Team at Macomb High. So, we like to support that and be involved in that.
Going to school and running a business at the same time - it's time-consuming, but
it was my senior year so I didn't have as many classes - it was a little bit
easier for me and plus, when I went, when I did my internship spring of 2014, I was
doing my internship through Dana, so she was kind of helping us learn what we
needed to do as far as, like paying employees and how to set up a schedule,
things like that. So, we were still kind of working with her our first year of
owning Project Dance Company. She helped us out a little bit and then from there
we just figured it out on our own kind of - and still having the help of our
parents and...we are in there basically every day of
the week. You're in there Saturdays even sometimes, but we're in there every day
and a week from 3-10 o'clock at night...even on Fridays, and back then it
was like Thursdays for like, and it wasn't even as long it was like maybe
before like 4-8, Monday through Thursday, so it's really, it's crazy to think how,
you know, I know we were in school, but how much it has grown since, you know, day
one. Like I said, we said, we're on our sixth year and we hope to keep
continuing to inspire younger children to express themselves.
We're constantly learning new things, you know. We've made plenty of mistakes
growing up and learning our business. Mistakes happen and you learn from your
mistakes, but also, it's definitely a rewarding experience, so all of that.
Maybe with the struggles and the tough times we've been through, it's so
rewarding to see where all of it's going and seeing our students grow and
accomplish new skills and becoming the people they are - it's all worth it. It's
amazing...it's definitely amazing. I think one
thing about Macomb that I love the most is everybody's just so close here,
I feel like. Everybody, everyone knows everybody knows each other...and the
schools aren't terribly big. You still kind of, you know, you're, you're involved
with things - there's things I hear the kids talk about, they're involved in
things. Yeah the support is wonderful and everybody's just so tight knit, it, it,
it's just a homey place, I feel like, and welcoming.
I mean as long as, as long as there are kids, there's always going to be, you know,
kids who want to dance, I feel like. I feel like it's like that anywhere, but
specifically here. Like we said, it's where we grew up it's our home and we
have a lot of relationships here and the older the kids get, the more they turn
into people, so they become, you know, you become attached, they become attached and,
you know, it's not like it's school where most, I guess, teachers have kids for
fourth grade and they move on the fifth. We, I mean, there's some kids we've had
since they were 6 and they're juniors in high school now, and, or sophomores,
even, so we, I feel like, we're a lot of, we're a big part of their life we're big
influence and a role model in their life and we try to be the the best influence
as possible on them.