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Current News at The Maine Dance Academy |
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CLASSES BEGIN Tuesday, SEPTEMBER 14, 2010 September Newsletter 2010 Welcome back to The Maine Dance Academy!! So many new faces to see this fall and so many returning ones to welcome back! What a year we have planned for all of you. Your instructors have been busy cutting music and choreographing your new songs so we hope you are all as ready as we are. We are excited about a lot of things this year and we have so much to tell you about so……on with the news! Class Lists: Your instructors have been working diligently to put our fall classes together. We have watched the recital DVD over and over again; analyzed it from one end to the other. We have gone over our end of the year notes and compared them to your child’s time and effort in class. We looked at your child’s attitude and eagerness to learn. Once we did all that….we started with Company and worked our way down to Temple. Because of student numbers and the fact that Miss Danielle is pregnant, we had no choice but to combine some classes( be aware of this when you are looking over the class lists) so as to bring each class to 16-18 children per class. We had a few classes last year that were 11 children or less and it just doesn’t work for the instructors or the students. I think we have done the best job we possibly could in placing your children; we want them all to succeed and so we have placed them in classes that they will do just that. Your children really make the decision for us; what they show us in class and at recital is really what we base all of our decisions on. With that said, these classes are final. If we feel we have made a mistake in placing your child, we will notify you within the first 2 weeks of classes. Please respect our decisions because we did not make them lightly: many hours and debate went into putting this year’s schedule together and we hope that you trust us enough to know what is best for your children. We certainly do not want to lose any of our dancers over our placement decisions and that is why we work very hard to determine which class your children will succeed to their fullest potential in. Thank you for giving us the chance to teach your children; we will do our very best for them. This year we have 4 Troupe classes as well as Company. Our dancers have become that talented that we decided that we needed these 5 groups to place them all in. We have also posted the new dance schedule as well as to what type of dance your children will begin dancing with. If your child is starting with tap, please make sure they have their tap shoes for the first day of class. If you need supplies of any kind, please make sure you come to the studio earlier for those supplies so that your children can be ready when class begins. The store will open 15 minutes early on Tuesday and Wednesday for the first classes to purchase thier supplies. Remember, that all children must be dressed in black only and in dance gear and we will not allow children that are not dressed this way to participate in dance class for that day. We will tape in all classes during the first week of dance so please make sure you have your flash drives with you. Below you will find the Class Lists and the Class Schedule. Double click on these prompts and a word document will open. Find your child’s name and dance class and then go the class schedule to see what day and time your children are dancing. Look at the song that your children are doing and what style it is. If it is jazz or hip hop, they will either need black sneakers, black jazz/ballet shoes or paws. It says tap, they will need their taps for the first day of class. All modern and contemporaries will need paws. We have figured out for sure some of the shoe requirements and they are as follows: Troupe & Twitch will need a black folding chair from Wal-mart for your first day of class, Sonja, Twitch & Troupe you will need character shoes, Tiny you will need paws, Petite will need black gore boots. We will tell you what the rest of the shoe requirements are the first day of class! All new Company girls: You need to learn Jai-Ho before the first day of class. If you need to have it put on your jump drive, please contact Clarann or I to get that done for you! Some thoughts while reading your child’s placement in classes: Temple Parents: Please allow us 1 month with your children before deciding if your child is ready for dance or not. If we see after a month that he/she is just not ready for dance, we will speak with you. We know how to handle crying children, believe us…we can handle them. Don’t worry, all of our Temple students cry at one time or another but usually after 1 month with us, they settle into a routine and believe or not, they actually learn to dance!! Troupe Students & Company: If your child has made one of our 4 troupe classes or Company, you must have a signed Troupe/Company contract with you on the first day of class. NO EXCEPTIONS. Please read the contract carefully before you sign it and make sure your child understands what it means to be placed in Troupe or Company class. I will be collecting these during our first parent watch. The Troupe/Company contract is to the right of this newsletter in the box of downloads. Please download this and bring it to your first class. Junior Instructors: All of our classes have an instructor and a junior instructor. Your junior instructor will be e-mailing the parents of their classes with updates for that class such as: if your child has missed 2 classes in a row, if your child is a Troupe/Company dancer and has come to class unprepared, if your class is going to be staying later the following week so you can prepare ahead, when your costumes are ready for pick up etc…. So it is imperative that you read these e-mails. If you do not have the internet, please try to find a parent in your class that does so that she/he can update you with all of this imperative information. If you have any questions concerning the above information, we will have our first parent watch the first day of class in all classes to answer all of your questions. Please be at this very important parent watch, we will invite all parents into the purple studio 15 minutes before the end of each class to go over this schedule and all the information contained in this newsletter. If you need to speak with me before classes start, please email me or Clarann at misscolleen@themainedanceacademy.com or missclarann@themainedanceacademy.com and we promise to get back to you ASAP! Pointe Class: All children in Pointe class must wear black leotards, pink tights, pink or black wrap skirt, pink ballet or Pointe shoes and their hair in a bun. Please do not send your children to Pointe with their hair untied, it gets in their way when they are practicing turns. If your child is not dressed appropriately for Pointe, they will receive a warning the first time. The second time, they will sit out during their class. Remember, when you send your child to soccer, they must be dressed appropriately…..dance is no different. Finally, all girls must bring their ballet shoes and their Pointe shoes to the first ballet class. Even if you have your Pointe shoes, you still must bring your ballet shoes for the first class. (Baryshnikov you need only bring your Pointe shoes) Parent Watch: We will have parent watch in all classes the first week of dance, the 14th and 15th of September. We won’t be dancing for you because we are going to go over the newsletter and the process of how we video tape our classes. You will see your children dance for the first time during our October parent watch! Jump Drives/Flash Drives for videotaping: We will be again recording our classes on jump/flash drives. You will all need to purchase a jump drive: you can purchase these at Wal- Mart or Staples . These jump drives will plug right into your computers. We will go over this on the first day of class during parent watch so that everyone understands how we will record our classes for your children. Please attach your jump/flash drive to a key chain with your child’s name, class name on it and what town you live in. The students will still enter class with your drives and then you can pick them up outside the store when the secretaries are through downloading them all for you. We will not be converting them to DVD’s this year as this just takes too long…..you will have to purchase this program and convert it yourself. We will go over this with all of you as well on parent watch day. VERY IMPORTANT: NO ONE WILL BE ALLOWED TO PLACE ANY OF OUR STUDIO RECORDINGS ON THE INTERNET. THESE RECORDINGS ARE THE SOLE PROPERTY OF TMDA. IF ANYONE IS FOUND LOADING OUR CHOREOGRAPHY ONTO THE INTERNET, THEY WILL BE DISMISSED FROM TMDA IMMEDIATELY. ALL PARENTS WILL SIGN A CONSENT FORM AT PARENT WATCH ACCEPTING THESE TERMS OF THIS RECORDING AGREEMENT. Helpful Reminders: Please make sure that all shoes are taken off in the entrance and put away in the wooden cubbies. This rule goes for all students and parents as well. No shoes should be left in the entrance; they must be placed in the cubbies as we do not want anyone tripping over shoes as they are walking in. There are so many people in and out of the entrance in between classes that we absolutely need your 100% cooperation with this matter. Please make sure you go home with the correct shoes too as each week we have kids without shoes because someone has taken theirs by mistake. Please be more careful about this. There is also no running in the hallways at anytime. The floors have all been freshly waxed for the season so please keep your children with you at all times. If you see kids running, please ask them to stop. The tile floor is hard and we don’t want anyone to get hurt. Tuition: Tuition for the fall is due by September 22, 2010. Tuitions received past this date will have a $10.00 late fee added to them each week. Please help our secretaries out by paying your tuitions on time. Tuitions are as follows: 45 minute to 1 hour classes: $150.00 1 hour and 15 minute classes: $170.00 1 hour and 30 minute classes: $190.00 Payment Plans: For those of you who absolutely need a payment plan, please download the Payment Plan Form to the right of this newsletter and bring it with you the first week of dance. These are due immediately when dance starts. We ask that only those that absolutely need payment plans use this form as our secretaries are too busy to be accepting payments each month from all of our dancers. The secretaries spend a large amount of their time taping for all of you and passing out costumes. Having to take monthly payments from all of our dancers would slow them down from having your tapes ready for you before you leave dance class. You must adhere to the rules of the payment plan so please read it carefully before passing them into your secretaries. Costumes: We are instituting a new rule this year concerning costumes. Every year I am left with costumes from students not picking them up. I now order all costumes out of current catalogs so as to get the correct sizes for each child therefore you will all need to pay a $40.00 deposit on costumes before September 30th, 2010 for me to do this. This $40.00 will be credited towards you last costume that you receive. If all of your costumes arrive at the same time, we will put the $40.00 towards the total cost of all of your costumes. The deposit is required for us to order your costumes. If you miss this date, we will order your costume when you pay your deposit and you will be required to pay the extra shipping charges as well. If a costume is ordered for you and you quit before your costume comes in, you can either pay the extra cost for the rest of the costume or lose your deposit and we keep the costume. More Important Dates: Fall Semester: September 14, 2010 thru Jan. 13, 2011: Tuition due September 22, 2010 without any late fees. Spring Semester: January 18, 2011 thru May 15, 2011: Tuition due January 26, 2011 without any late fees. Christmas Show: December 12, 2010 at 2pm at Caribou Performing Arts Center. (4 tickets per family, Cost is $10.00 for all 4 tickets.) Year End Recital: Friday, May 13, 2011 @ 7pm C-Pac Saturday, May 14, 2011 @ 7pm C-Pac Sunday, May 15, 2011 @ 2pm C-Pac Huge News!! Clarann and I have been asked to produce the entire Opening Ceremonies for the World Cup Biathlon Championships on February 3, 2011. This is a huge honor for the both of us and we gladly accepted this honor. Of course, they have asked our dancers to be a part of the Opening Ceremonies as well. Our theme is “World Dances” as we want to show case as many styles of dance that we can. Our 4 Troupes and Company will dance during the Opening Ceremonies. We have asked that all the flag bearers for each country be a member of TMDA and that all of our dancers that are skiers for their schools be part of opening ceremonies as well. These are still things we are negotiating but as soon as I know more, I will let all of you know. I want to include as many of our dancers as possible in the opening ceremonies. We have a meeting on the 8th of September and after that I will be able to tell you exactly how many dancers I will be needing (besides the children that are dancing for the entertainment portion) for the ceremonies. I will also need parents to facilitate a lot of things that will be happening during the Opening Ceremonies so be ready….I will be asking for help. I will have an update on Colleen’s corner after our meeting with the committee, so please refer to that corner. I will also call a meeting for all the parents and dancers involved the first week of October. This will all be updated in the October newsletter. This will be a great experience for our dancers and Clarann and I look forward to working with you! Happy Birthday Emily!!! Miss Colleen will never forget your day…. I kinda think it is special!!! Thank you so much for bringing your children to TMDA! Please feel free to contact us with any and all of your concerns. Clarann, Danielle, Jessica, Deanna, Vicki and Michelle and I welcome you all to The Maine Dance Academy Miss Colleen, xxoo 207-498-4027 Miss Colleen 207-498-4027 |
| Recent and past Newsletters: Just double clink on the Newsletters below to print in a Word Document format. November 2009 Newsletter October 2009 Newsletter December 2009 Newsletter January 2010 Newsletter February Newsletter 2010 March 2010 Newsletter April 2010 Newsletter May Recital Newsletter 2010 June 2010 Newsletter July Newsletter 2010 August 2010 Newsletter September 2010 Newsletter |
| The Schedule and Contract will be available September 3, 2010. If you are a Troupe or Comany dancer, you must have the contract filled and with you for the first day of dance. If you need a payment schedule, they must be filed with the secretaries by September 22, 2010. |
