With “California Girls” blasting on the speaker, the sun warming the grass and kids jumping around to learn the choreography, the famed lyrics have never been more true: “Toned, tanned, fit, and ready/Turn it up ‘cause it’s gettin’ heavy”. The high-energy environment is precisely why this DreamxDancers class was dance instructor senior Lauren Murakami’s favorite memory.
DreamxDancers is a student-led nonprofit providing accessible jazz, cheer and ballet classes to the youth and sharing dance culture with the community. CEO Ayaka Sonehara and COO Alisa Sonehara, her sister, originally founded this organization to share their passion of dance with the next generation of students. This year, they are donating 50% of their profits to MedShare, a global healthcare nonprofit.
A typical Saturday afternoon class has around 10 elementary school-aged students and begins with icebreakers, stretches and interactive techniques to teach the dance moves. After a game halfway through class, students perform the dance they’ve learned to an audience.
For dance instructor sophomore Vivian Wang, this is the best part.
“My favorite part is at the end (when) kids are really proud they’re performing, and then the parents are smiling and taking videos, and it’s just so fun and so rewarding,” she said.
Even though the dance moves are relatively straightforward for the seasoned dance instructors, these classes don’t come without their challenges. For dance instructor senior Lilia Alishahian, the surprise-factor of working with young children is always difficult.
“We are unsure of how prepared we are for a dance class, because even though we have done the choreography prior, I feel nervous having a live audience to teach to,” she said. “Sometimes they just ask really out-of-pocket things and we have to figure out how to respond to that.”
Despite these issues, it’s the connection between the students and their instructors that makes volunteering for DreamxDancers all worth it.
“One time after class, these kids were really really excited about the dance and they were like ‘You guys did so good!’ and they gave us a cookie,” Alishahian said. “I didn’t know where they had the cookie the whole time but they just whipped it out and gave it to us.”
Murakami reflected on a similar experience when a student gave her and Alishahian handmade stickers as a gift.
“(These interactions) really make my time here as an instructor and being in a nonprofit so rewarding because you get to meet these kids who look up to you from a dancer’s perspective,” she said.
Murakami reflects on her own dance journey, reminiscing on her love for dance when she was her students’ age.
“I love to see (the kids) grow throughout the classes and just be able to see how much they love dance and how much they love performing,” she said. “I kind of like to see myself through them.”
For both Wang, Murakami and Alishahian, this experience has translated into lessons and useful skills for their own dance journeys on the cheer team at Gunn.
“This changed my perspective on cheer a bit because honestly the kids are doing a lot better than I thought they would,” Wang said. “In my mind, I thought (of cheer) as something for teenagers but it’s a lot more universal and inclusive than I thought.”
