Marco Dance Academy Piles Up the Trophies

The Marco Island Dance Academy competition team closed out their 2025 comp season with multiple awards and trophies across their six total competitions for the Jan 2025 - July 2025 season. The overall team competition had their final competition on May 3 and 4 at “Headliners” competition at the Ft. Myers High School and finished with two first-place overall wins for their Petite Team and Junior Teams. The junior team consisted of Delaney Dolan, Emma Dennis, Hudson Clayton, Gianna Russo, Roselyn Burke, Marisa Munera, Ellie Flowers, Jacab Ungashick, and Kaden Croscenco, who performed their routine “HOPE,” a flashy contemporary piece that wowed the judges into a first place overall and a special judges' award for amazing choreography. The petite team performed “WORK,” a sassy musical theatre performance, with the team consisting of Delaney Simon, Kora Croscenco, Bella Salomon, Alexa Russo, Isabella Shaughnessy, Kinsley Dolan, Fiona Hager, and Vivienne Tierney who also placed first overall, and received two special judges awards for “total package” and excellence in choreography awards. Both teams also received ELITE GOLD scores. This is the first time over the five-year history of Marco Island Dance Academy’s competition career that a team representing the studio has scored the highest level available in a competition. The scoring is as follows: Elite Gold ( 570 or higher), High Gold (546-569), Gold (522-545), High Silver (498- 521), or Silver ( 480-497).

Two shining star dancers from the Petite team, Kora Croscenco and Bella Salomon, also performed a duet titled “Ev’rbody wants to be a Cat,” which also placed first overall at the Headliners competition. This dynamic duo went on to compete in the Imagine Dance Nationals on July 4, 2025, in Boston, Massachusetts, at the Westin Hotel. This was a national competition of dancers and dance studios all across the United States. The girls competed amongst over 3,000 routines that were a part of the week-long nationals and competed against over 50 duet/trio routines, performed their duet, and placed first overall and received two first-place trophies over five feet tall. They were announced as the first place overall Duet National Champions. The girls have danced together at the studio for five years and have really grown together over the years.

Kora Croscenco went on to also perform her solo “Dream,” which is a beautiful lyrical genre routine that captivated the judges, won her a special judges' award for “total package,” and was announced the second place overall National Champion and received a slightly smaller (but still four-foot tall) national champion trophy.

The Marco Island Dance Academy competition team starts a new season this August 11 with a new, larger team of 39 dancers. This year, the team will be adding in more routines, more solos, more duets, and a Grand Line Production titled “Marco Island” that will be a fun spin on the beach on Marco Island and will contain all 39 dancers at one time. Every year we are expanding our team and studio. This year marks our five year anniversary as a studio, and we are thrilled to be able to continue to grow and develop these young dancers. There is so much talent on the island, and we are helping to foster their talent into creative outlets via dance and martial arts. The studio has many classes available for sign-up, including all levels of ballet, street jazz, pom cheer, lyrical and contemporary, and a fully certified acro and tumbling mat program, as well as mixed martial arts classes.