We enrolled our 5-year old daughter in two of the NSAD Saturday classes for pre-school age kids. The dance instructors are caring, energetic, and our daughter loved them all. Unfortunately, the administration has plenty of room for improvement. The change area is much too small and I really do not understand how the fire marshall allows so many people (including kids) in such a small confined space during class changes. It looks more crowded than a typical train station in Asia. Total chaos !!
For the dress rehersal at the end of the course, 5-year olds are expected to manage their own costumes without many assistance from parents or instructors. There is a "bouncer" that takes the child into the stage door near the loading dock while the rest of the theatre is locked out to parents. Bouncer tells the parents that someone will help the kids to change and when a concerned parent asks about who will assist the children to get changed, he gets testy and starts to threaten the deeply concerned parent. Really disheartening to leave my 5-year old child with people that she doesn't know in the hands of a bouncer and other people that she's never seen before in a big dance theatre. I spoke to other parents and they agreed that the rehersal should be handled better for the younger kids that need parental assistance. Suggest providing an area where the parents can change the kids and bring them completely ready for the dance routine. So sad that the work of super instructors has to be overshadowed by people that probably never had kids but expect 5-year olds to dress themselves as 10-15 year olds would. Full stars for the instructors but negative stars for the bouncer and the administration.