I'm torn between rating this a 2 and a 3. I'll start off by saying I danced for about 12 years,…read morestarting as a preschooler up through high school. This was the third studio I danced for in Salisbury, after taking a two years break from dance in middle school. Feet of Fire was relatively new (I believe they were in either their second or third year when I began dancing there). Even in the short amount of time they had been open, I had heard about them and seen them perform, and thought it was some place I'd really enjoy dancing. Since I hadn't danced in two years, I first joined as a recreational student, with the idea to possibly move up into their performance troupe after I got myself back into the swing of things.
That's the first con in my opinion: they have a competition team, as well as performance troupe that performs at various events all over the shore. If you're just simply a recreational student with no ties to the performance troupe or competition team, you're just another person who walks in the door a few times a week to take class and pays tuition. That's it, you're really nobody. You have to audition for both teams, and I've heard it's pretty difficult to get in. The dancers are fantastic though, I will give them that. All classes are grouped by age rather than dance experience. This isn't really a good method in my opinion because there may be a mix of very experienced dancers and girls that haven't danced at all, all grouped into one class. The classes are slowed down for the beginners, and as someone with a good deal of experience under my belt, it was a bit frustrating.
The class sizes for recreational students is horrendous, especially for the older girls. Anyone over the age of 12 is immediately thrown into the "Teen" class, which can consist of middle schoolers to college age students, and anywhere in between. These classes sometimes push 20+ students, which makes for a cramped dance studio and a slow moving class as others have to catch up while rehearsing. Not sure about the classes for younger kids, but they also have multiple classes for the same age group, so I would imagine they're a bit smaller. So I guess the older girls get the short end of the stick. I was also treated poorly as a student, which is one reason why I left and found another studio after only one year.
Most of their dance teachers aren't really qualified; they're just former students who are now teaching classes. To me, that's okay I guess for small children who aren't really "dancing", since classes for preschoolers tend to be more creative movement oriented. But for older students wanting to dance and/or possibly work towards a career, that isn't appropriate. The owner of the studio (and one of the only qualified instructors) works almost exclusively with the performance troupe and competition team members.
This studio also offers no form of classical ballet instruction. None whatsoever. I realize not every dancer wants to take classical ballet, I was one of them. But I was forced to take five years of it and I think it really helped me overall in the dance world, since ballet is the basis for basically every style of dance. I think all dancers under the age of 7 should be enrolled in traditional ballet classes, then if they want to branch out into other styles of dance, then at least they have some foundation. I don't know, maybe just my personal opinion.
Overall, this studio isn't bad, but it isn't great either. Their performance troupe and competition team are fantastic, but recreational dancing is so-so. If you're looking to become a strong competitive dancer, this is definitely the place for you. If you're just dancing for fun, I'd think about another studio, unless you don't mind being treated like another number. I think they're more focused on the money.
