Dance Kids Canada

How does a child develop focus, commitment and the ability to prioritize? All of these qualities are essential for later life, but if a child doesn’t learn them early on, it’s tough to pick them up as an adult.

Amanda Ramrup, owner of Dance Kids Canada, swears that regular dance lessons are one way of introducing a child to the kinds of qualities that will enable them to face the trials and tribulations of day-to-day life as they mature. “It doesn’t happen overnight though,” she says. “I notice that the kids who develop these skills have been with us for 10 years or more.”

Amanda knows first-hand how determination pays off. When she was 10 years old, after attending the Thornhill School of Ballet for several years, she told its owner that one day she would buy it. “In my first year of university that’s exactly what I did,” she says. “I put a down payment on the business then covered the rest with my first month of tuition fees. Two years later, I bought a second school.” In 2007, Amanda re-named both schools Dance Kids Canada and a generation of new dancers was born.