SDR Launches Leadership Development Initiative

Strong leadership has always been essential to the success of square and round dancing. As clubs and organizations face new challenges—from attracting new dancers to developing future volunteers and leaders—Square Dance Revival (SDR) is beginning work on a comprehensive Leadership Development Program designed specifically for the square and round dance community. Drawing on proven leadership models used by successful nonprofits, associations, and volunteer organizations, the program will focus on practical skills such as recruiting and retaining members, building welcoming club cultures, effective communication, volunteer engagement, succession planning, and leading positive change.

As part of this effort, SDR needs input from dancers, callers, cuers, club officers, and association leaders across the country. We know this survey is not short, and your time is valuable. However, the future of square and round dancing is worth the effort. Your experiences, opinions, and ideas will help guide leadership development, strengthen clubs, and identify the changes needed to attract and retain dancers. Few opportunities have as much potential to influence the future of our activity as this survey. This button goes directly to the survey:

This survey takes five minutes, and most answers are required to submit it. We hope to learn what members believe today's leaders are doing well, what challenges need to be addressed, and what leadership topics would be most valuable for future training. Our goal is to create free, accessible resources that help clubs develop confident leaders, strengthen organizations, and ensure a vibrant future for square and round dancing. We invite everyone who cares about the future of our activity to participate and help shape this important initiative.

Podcast Paused for the Summer

We'll be recording over the summer and back in September

If you missed a podcast, you can still listen to all of them!

Hunter Keller: Calling the Future of Square Dancing

The Lang Family: Reviving Clubs with Young People

Allan Hurst: The Future of Square Dancing Belongs to Clubs that Evolve

John & Karen Herr: Why Round Dance? It's All About FUN!

Justin Russell: Let's Have Honest Conversations About the Future of Square Dancing

Mike Sattler: How We Attract & Retain New Members

Paul & Linda Robinson: Welcome New Dancers As They Are

Mike Seastrom: Why Community Matters More Than Ever

Send Us Your Success Story! Meet the Colorado Pueblo Pepper Steppers!

If you can't be at the Triple Scoot Salute for the Square Dance Revival Presentation, click here for the long and short versions of our presentation

Square Dance Revival wants to share the success stories of rebuilding club membership or starting new clubs around the country. Tell us about your club history, what you did to rebuild, and what the results were. Sharing what didn't work is also helpful for other clubs.

Send your club's stories and photos to leslie@squaredancerevival.org, and we'll post them to inspire others!

New Training Material

All of our resource documents are free. Here is what's new:

• Website Do's & Don'ts (Focused on Attracting New Dancers)
• Design Great Lesson Flyers
• Design a Website Home Page (Focused on Attracting New Dancers)
• Use ChatGPT to Write Clear, Powerful Club Promotions*

*We recognize AI is controversial. It is a tool, and the impacts of AI on the future are unknown and unregulated.

Did you know that Mike Seastrom, caller extraordinaire, has written some great articles to help clubs navigate the future of square dancing? You can find them here: https://mikeseastrom.com/articles/​

National Social Media Campaign!

“Busting myths. Welcoming dancers. Reviving the joy of dancing together.”

Square Dance Revival is spending $300 per month in our National Social Media Campaign to introduce new people to modern square and round dancing.

Over the last four, we've reached over a half a million people throughout the country. Almost 1000 people clicked through to learn more about clubs in their area. Please keep your club and lesson information up to date on the various "find a club" sites.

Repeated exposure to these ads will continue to build interest in finding out why we are having so much fun. As our podcast experts have told us, it will take time and repeated exposure to how much fun square dancing is to bring in more new members over the next few years.

This funding allows us to reach thousands of potential dancers every month through targeted advertising:

• $150 on Facebook and Instagram ads, reaching approximately 18,750 people
• $150 on TikTok ads, reaching approximately 30,000 people, primarily younger audiences

Our campaign targets people interested in fitness, health, social dancing, family activities, and fun local activities. According to Meta’s audience data, this represents a potential audience of over 300 million people who may be open to discovering square and round dancing.

We spent our first $100 donation lin April, which allowed us to expand the campaign's reach across the country by raising the daily budget from $10 to $13.30 per day. This results in 1/6 of our target audience viewing upbeat, engaging interviews with square dancers of all ages and affiliations.

Your donation directly increases the reach of this campaign.

Find out how much impact you can make here:​​

Every dollar allows us to introduce dancing to more people, faster—helping more clubs connect with new dancers and bringing new energy into the activity we love.

Together, we can show a new generation that square and round dancing are fun, social, healthy, and welcoming for everyone.

If you see one of our promotional interviews on your social media, please let us know!

Round Dance Promotional Interviews Available for Use Soon!

The videos are in draft and we are tweaking for maximum effectiveness. They will used in the national campaign to increase awareness of round dancing and build membership. A heartfelt thanks to the Colorado Round Dance Association, the interviewees, and specifically Denise Behrens, Cuer, and Rhonda, Round Dancer Extraordinaire, for their help and support in making this project successful.

You will also be able to use these interviews in your own social media campaign to advertise for lessons. For free! Here is a taste of the drafts: