The School at Steps in New York City, New York, is a division of Steps on Broadway, an internationally recognized community of artists, committed to the cultivation of individuality and talent, to the joy, the work, the focus, and the abandon of dance.
Under the tutelage of Kate Thomas, the school’s director, The School at Steps cultivates young dancers, ages 3 months to 18 years of age, from their first step in a dance studio through their pre-professional training. Students discover their individual artistic voices in a creative environment with the guidance of an internationally recognized faculty. The personal attention the school provides encourages students to mature as dancers, grow as individuals, and enrich their passion for the art form. School at Steps graduates go on to dance with professional companies, study at top college dance programs, and perform on Broadway. Classes are offered seven days a week at all levels in ballet, jazz, modern, contemporary, tap, theater dance, hip hop, ethnic, and body conditioning.
Actually, The School at Steps is really three schools in one. Each of the three programs they offer; Young Dancers, Technique, and Pre-Professional, encompass its own focus, goals, and specifications. The Young Dancers Program (ages 3 months to 5 years of age) teaches their tiniest dancers body-awareness and musicality prior to introducing technique and positions. The Technique Program (ages 6 to18 years of age) is designed for the more recreational dancer who often dances one or more times a week, and offers a range of dance classes from ballet to jazz, and theater dance to hip hop. This program also features a Song and Dance Workshop, complete with final performance, which provides students with singing, acting, dancing, and performance skills. The Pre-Professional Program (ages 7 to 18 years of age) is a ballet-based curriculum program designed for the dedicated dance student. Seven levels of ballet, augmented with Horton-based Modern, Theater Dance, Jazz, Character, Tap, Hip Hop, and Pas de Deux classes offer a uniquely diverse approach to intensive dance training for both aspiring ballet and musical theater dancers.
Kate learned very quickly that they could not address all the needs of an aspiring dancer through technique classes alone and added dance history classes, audition workshops, and The Complete Dancer Series events to their calendar. The Complete Dancer Series consists of three annual events covering topics such as injury prevention, pointe shoe fitting and care, dancing in college, healthy body workshops, and more. The School’s multidisciplinary curriculum taught by gifted professionals sets their Pre-Professional division apart. They are one of the few training programs that offers ballet based training, while supporting a variety of dance disciplines. The School’s primary goal is to produce classically trained and versatile dancers.
As The School’s director, Kate is proud of the enormous growth of The School at Steps and the advancement in ability, strength, and technique of their dancers. She is honored to say that she is able to set repertory from her own company, Ballet Neo, as she would on the professional dancers she works with. Knowing they are training dancers to be technically capable to work with choreographers is a wonderful accomplishment. To witness the development of young students as they grow with The School over the years and see them learn patience, persistence, attention to detail, discipline, teamwork and self-motivation is immensely rewarding.
Kate believes that maintaining an honest self-image that is not distorted by the mirror or their fellow dancers is a challenge for young dancers. It can be difficult for them to take a step back to fairly and honestly assess themselves. The goal of The School at Steps is to help them set and achieve realistic goals. Kate wants them to understand that it is less about comparison, but rather about being better than you were the day before. The staff at The School at Steps tries and serves as a resource and positive influence for their students going through these tough times, especially as adolescents.
As far as goals for The School, Kate first hopes to continue to broaden the footprint of the school in their NYC dance community. This includes broadening the resources, of the doctors or physical therapists that they currently offer their students even her. It also includes connecting the bridge that places graduating dancers into colleges, dance companies, or Broadway shows. Kate hopes the school will be able to offer this for any dancer, no matter their dance dreams.
Secondly, Kate wants to continue working to increase the exposure their Pre-Professional dancers have with choreographers and professional dancers. The School is fortunate to share their studios and halls with Steps on Broadway and have begun welcoming teachers from the open program into their classes. With this, they hope to expand their experiences working with the best, and to understand how to adjust to various dance styles and teaching personalities. Some of the first faculty members have included the wonderful David Howard, Michael Vernon, Karin Averty, Richard Pierlon, and Jeff Shade.
And last but not at all least, Kate will continue to strive to cultivate empowerment for their students through a curriculum grounded in classical ballet that is supported by diverse dance disciplines. She hopes to prepare confident artists who can apply the transferable education, rooted in dance training, to all of their life choices.
Eleven years ago, The School at Steps had a great faculty but very little structure. Through trust, trial and error, Kate has been able to shape these fabulous classes into multiple levels, a cohesive curriculum, and specific programs with goals, age specifications and a high retention rate. She is excited to share that the number of students in the school has doubled since she began. Kate has taken a handful of dance classes for children and turned them into a Pre-Professional Training Program in a unified dance school.
Outside of The School at Steps, Kate is the Founder and Artistic Director of the contemporary ballet company, Ballet Neo.
Please post a comment if you have had any experience with The School at Steps of Dance or Kate Thomas.
