South Sound Dance Access

South Sound Dance Access fosters a healthy and resilient community in the South Puget Sound through ensuring access to dance, movement, and the performing arts for people of all ages, as a means of mental and physical health, creative expression, and community building. We believe that Movement is Medicine! We live out our mission by taking dance out of the studios and into the community to meet people where they are: through bringing Creative Dance and Brain Compatible Dance Education programs into public schools, senior living communities, seniors centers, partnering with originations serving children and adults with special needs, and more! 

Our Vision and Belief: 
We envision a world where people of all ages have access to the performing arts, dance, and movement regardless of socioeconomic class, race, gender, sexuality, or any other form of social positioning. We believe that dance and the arts can be life saving work that is vital for mental and physical health, and this belief is backed by emerging science regarding the body-mind connection, social emotional learning, and the nervous system. 

What is Creative Dance: 
Creative Dance and Brain Compatible Dance Education is a pedagogy created by world renowned movement educator Anne Green Gilbert. This pedagogy uses developmental science and multi-sensory teaching strategies for all different learning styles to create an environment in which the brain is ready and able to learn. Our students are given the opportunity to learn dance skills and also to develop their own creative ideas and voices through movement explorations, improvisation, and choreography. Encouraging innovation, creativity and collaboration. This pedagogy nurtures the whole human, supporting our students in all of their endeavors, both inside and outside of dance class. 

Our History:  
South Sound Dance Access was founded in the fall of 2022. We grew out of, and work in partnership with, South Sound Dance studio in Tumwater, WA. In the summer of 2022, Hannah Taylor, CEO and founder of South Sound Dance, and Alice Grendon, Executive Director and founder of South Sound Dance Access, became ready to put in motion the creation of an organization they had been dreaming up for some time: a way to give back to the community in the South Puget Sound region and share the power of the performing arts for everyone – South Sound Dance Access was born! Access is the heart of our mission we know that movement is medicine, and we want to create pathways for anyone who wants it to access the power, joy, creativity, physical health benefits, nervous system regulation, mental health benefits, confidence building, and connection that dance and movement provides.