Waukee Northwest State Dance

The Dance team at Waukee Northwest heads to state.

The Dance team at Waukee Northwest has had a rollercoaster of a season, starting off with some work that needed to be done, and ending up with a 1st place in contemporary and a 2nd place in pom at the State Championship 2021. Being a brand new high school brought a fresh start for all teams, and for the dancers of Northwest, they feel it brought them success and motivation. While state brought many of these girls some nerves, it also brought excitement, confidence, and great preparation. Jordan Dawson, senior and dancer at Northwest stated, “practices leading up to state were so much fun, they were so positive, and I think that really contributed to us doing well.” Jordan was also a state soloist and was honored to accept the 1st place crown and sash this year. She went on to say, “I was also a state soloist last year, and this year those people got to hand out the awards, so when I was holding the crown and sash I was expecting to crown someone else, but it ended up being me!” 

On a normal week, the dance team practices Tuesday night, Thursday morning, Saturday morning, and Sunday night. Most consist of performing their routines for each other and working on skills that they feel need work, but leading up to state, their practices looked a little different than usual. During the final practice before state, they held a mindset practice, where they played their music and did skills they felt were necessary, while also visualizing hitting their routine on the Wells Fargo floor. Natalie Becker, Junior and dancer at Northwest stated, “while having many good runs before state, we also had some rough runs, but we just tried to use those as our motivation, and as our coach said, we wanted to peak at state anyway.” The team uses the basketball games preceding state as their “practice performances” which helps boost their confidence before the big day. They also held a sendoff- which was great practice and a great way to increase the positivity around the team. Victoria Adams, sophomore and dancer at Northwest exclaimed, “when I heard our place get called, I felt relief, and I knew right away that all the hard work was worth that moment.” Northwest’s very first dance team put in countless hours of hard work and that really showed when they showed up to this year’s state championship. Proud of what they put out there, these girls left a legacy that will be remembered forever.