Contribute to the training of 200 young talents in Konpa Dance in Haiti

In a patriotic move, we decided in July 2011 to give special attention to Konpa dance, Haiti's then little-known social dance. At the time, we felt like cobblers with ill-shod shoes; we were running a benchmark social dance school, but the dance of our homeland, Konpa, was suffering from a lack of recognition, visibility and transmission. We had to do something about it! From then on, we began researching the subject, codifying and enriching Konpa dance, opening classes, first in Paris, then in Florida where we even introduced the teaching of Konpa in certain universities, and co-produced a television program exposing Konpa dance to a wider audience. Since then, we've been steadily increasing our activities to promote Konpa, such as the "Concours national de danse Konpa en Haïti (KDC)" and the "Festival international de Konpa en Haïti", in partnership with the Haitian Ministry of Culture (MCC), as well as publishing articles in newspapers and online. We had the privilege of representing Haiti with Konpa dance, accompanied by our Ballet Ayitidans dancers, in 2 major events: the "Haitian Compas Fest" in Martinique (2018) and Carifesta in Trinidad (2019). As part of our strategy to popularize Konpa dance, we also took to social networks very early on. The results are truly convincing! Back in 2011, when we googled "compas/kompa/konpa dance classes", the responses were more than insignificant, if not non-existent. Today, in 2025, reality has changed a great deal. Konpa dance is enjoying remarkable visibility on the web and is beginning to be taught just about everywhere in the world. And that's very encouraging. But the work is far from over! It has to be said that Konpa is still not on the same aura level as other dances in the same family, such as Salsa, Bachata or Kizomba, even though it has all the assets. Furthermore, its representation in the world is sometimes reductive, limiting it to the "Gouyad", a movement of the pelvis, a dance of the lower abdomen of an exclusively sexual nature, whereas it is, of course, much richer than that. In 2021, we published the book "Tout sur la danse Compas/Konpa," along with accompanying instructional videos, recognized by the MCC. The result of many years of research and experience, to facilitate the dissemination of Konpa dance, with a structured pedagogy that respects its fundamentals. Today, we feel it is essential to move up a gear and organize a mass training of trainers, starting in Haiti. That's precisely why we're knocking on your door and launching this crowdfunding campaign to invite you to help us carry out this training campaign by sponsoring the beneficiaries. As a prelude to this training, since the beginning of April, we have been meeting with schoolchildren in several schools in the city of Jacmel to raise their awareness of dance. It was a great pleasure for us to share these moments of culture with these young Jacmelites. It was a wonderful opportunity to exchange ideas and interact with them on the benefits of dance, the particularities of dance for two, and Konpa dance in particular. An enthusiastic and receptive audience! We can see that: - Our young people are thirsty for culture and art, -They don't know their own culture well enough, - They don't necessarily have the means to quench this thirst. The aesthetic and artistic education provided for in the official curriculum has a bright future ahead of it if it is properly implemented. This training is timely! Thank you in advance for helping our young people to get by, while supporting the positive influence of Haiti through its culture.