The teachers
Every teacher holds the Royal Academy of Dance or ISTD teaching qualification for what they teach, or a dance degree for the street and commercial work, and an enhanced DBS check. Most have danced for a living. All of them still take the beginners.
Danced with a touring company for eight years, taught at a vocational school in Bristol, and opened Tempo in 2009 in the old draper's on Commercial Street with one studio and forty dancers. RAD Registered Teacher Status, ISTD Associate, the examinations secretary and the one who tells parents the truth about vocational school. Still takes Pre-Primary on a Saturday because, she says, that is where the dancers are made.
Newport born, started in ballet here at seven and in street at eleven, danced commercially in London for six years including two arena tours, and came home in 2019 to build the street programme. BA Dance, enhanced DBS, and the coach of Tempo Collective, who placed second at the regionals last year. Teaches foundations first and will not teach a headspin to anyone under twelve, whatever the video says.
The rest of us
Safeguarding
RAD Registered Teacher Status for ballet, the ISTD Associate or Licentiate for tap and modern, a dance degree for street and commercial. The certificates are in reception and the registration numbers on the fine print of this website.
Every teacher, assistant, the pianist and the office hold an enhanced DBS check on the update service, with safeguarding training renewed yearly. Nerys is the designated lead and Marcus deputises.
Assistants are named, trained and always with a qualified teacher. Changing rooms are single-sex with a separate boys\' room, the front door is on a buzzer during classes, and no dancer under twelve leaves without the named adult.
Every teacher holds a current first-aid certificate. Both studios have sprung floors, which is the single biggest thing a dance school can do for a child\'s knees, and we re-sprang Studio 2 in 2023.
Teach here
We pay above the going rate per class, cover the exam-session fees and the CPD, and give a teacher their own grades for the year rather than cover. You need the RAD or ISTD qualification or a dance degree, a current DBS or the willingness to get one, and to teach a class in front of Nerys. Grade 8 dancers who want to assist are trained from sixteen.
Tell us the dancer's age and the style you are curious about, and the office rings back the same day with a class that has a space. Come in anything you can move in, stand at the back if you like, and decide afterwards. Or ring Bethan in the office.