Joelle Cosentino Wants Her Pre-Professional Students to Be Good Humans
May 8, 2020

Joelle Cosentino is on a mission to shake up dance education with an alternative model for pre-professional training. Because she turned her competition dance background into a star-studded career (she’s worked with Beyoncé, Mick Jagger and Lenny Kravitz), you might think her teaching goals would include a quest for rhinestones and first-place trophies. But by the time she became a teacher, Cosentino had become disillusioned with competition dance. “It had become so expensive,” she says. “Parents were getting sucked into endless routines and unreasonable hours.” She believed there was a better way, and to that end she created Z Artists Group—a New York City–based collective for pre-professional training with an emphasis on performance and advocacy.


The 20 junior-high- and high-school-aged dancers that she hand-selects each year for the company have performed at the Guggenheim, The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, The Joyce Theater and The UN General Assembly. They have also traveled to India, Cuba and Italy as part of their training. Their weekly schedule includes working with faculty such as Katy Spreadbury, Jason Williams, Miles Keeney and James Kinney. Guest faculty have included such stars as Emma Portner and Noel Bajandas.

To set the right tuition, Cosentino researched standard rates for suburban competitive dance studios nationwide, then cut the result in half. “Our school has a flat tuition rate that is paid monthly, and beyond that, everything is funded through donations. Private donors finance travel, and we use donations to offer scholarships to dancers who can’t afford tuition.”

The developing artists of Z Artists Group are also expected to advocate for a charitable cause. “Our kids each have a charity they are passionate about,” Cosentino says. For example, one dancer chose to focus on Alzheimer’s awareness this past year, and the troupe held an intergenerational dance class to help support the cause. “I want these dancers to understand what’s going on in the world and decide what’s important to them,” she says. “I want them to be good humans. I’m not raising dancers to stand at the barre and hope that one day someone will tell them they’re good enough. I want them to be confident, to go out there and make work they care about, to make their own decisions and to advocate for the kind of careers they want.”

MUST-HAVE TEACHING ATTIRE “I’m always wearing Bandier. They have the freshest and best selection of activewear. I’m also always in Apolla Shocks. They really give you the support you need.”

GO-TO AFTERNOON ENERGY BOOST “I am so ashamed to say this, but I drink sugar-free Red Bull or Clean Cause yerba mate (50 percent of their profits go toward helping recovering addicts) before I teach.”

FAVORITE BREAKFAST “I like to go to this little place on 25th Street in New York City called Sullivan Street Bakery—they make the best egg sandwiches!”

MUST-READ BOOK “My favorite book is The Fountainhead. It taught me a lot about being an individual with integrity.”

SKIN-CARE OBSESSION “I am obsessed with FADED [an anti-inflammatory bruise cream by Post Love Skincare]. I use it on all of my bruises after class.”

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