Carrie's Dream Scholarship Project was founded in 2014 as a tribute to Carrie Dianda McCoid. Carrie had a dream that all the students in our community who wanted to dance would be given that opportunity, regardless of their financial circumstances. She envisioned a collaborative annual dance showcase that would allow the community to come together to raise money for the benefit of aspiring dancers
. It would also serve to build bridges between all the dancers and studios and raise community awareness about the importance of dance to these students. For many of them their dance studio is their home away from home, dance is the thing they are most proud of. Dancing requires teamwork, leadership, dedication, physical and mental training as well as passion and perseverance. All immensely valuable skills that help keep our youth on the path to success in life. The value of these things cannot be measured in dollars and cents, but it takes just that to give these students those opportunities. This is our first step towards helping bring Carrie's dream to fruition. At this time we are not a nonprofit we are a sponsored project of Pacific Arts Complex or PAC www.pacificartscomplex.com. PAC has two studio locations (one in Santa Cruz & one in Watsonville) that serve an incredibly diverse group of students in our community, classes taught include everything from ballet to videography. Even though we are not a nonprofit entity at this time and as such contributions/donations are not tax deductible, ALL net proceeds from donations, auctions, projects and the annual showcase will be granted to scholarship applicants who otherwise would not have the opportunity and resources to dance. The scholarship selection process will involve evaluations of both financial need and individual student merit. In addition, we will be helping to sponsor the Aptos High Dance Team and offering some additional scholarship fund opportunities for participating studios in the annual showcase. As more funds are raised and available we look forward to further expanding our programs, but we can't do any of this without community support. Thank you for visiting our page, learning more about what it was Carrie envisioned and for helping us bring her dream to life. Her passion, dedication, strength and love continue to inspire so many. Maya Angelou once said "People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." She will never be forgotten.
