The Right WCS Mix For You

West Coast Swing is thriving in Ottawa, and we have many driving-distance opportunities to learn and social dance as well. Most of us have limited time, funds, and capacity to do it all, and it can feel overwhelming to make choices among the options.

This article provides some information to help you create the right mix. TLDR: refer to this handy infographic.

your goals

Before you can make the right choices, you’ll first need to understand your goals and priorities. Consider each of these potential goals and give each one a relative value of how important it is you at this time:

• Social experience: meet new people, connect with others, have fun
• Cohort experience: deepen relationships by sharing in a project with a cohort
• Community building: contribute to the development of a healthy and sustainable local community
• Personal development: explore personal goals, overcome limitations, address personal challenges/fears
• Competitive performance: achieve better results in competition (the weight of this will also depend on how many events you plan to compete at; more events = greater weight)
• Efficiency: achieve maximum improvement with limited resources
• Dance tourism: make travel more interesting and social by being part of the global dance community
• Dream catching: pursue a dream (examples: perform a routine with a partner, become a Champion)

Goals will change over time, so revisit this every year.

Your resources

Next, take stock of the resources you have to spend on this activity. Resources include:

• Time
• Money
• Mental & emotional capacity
• Physical ability
• Learning style

Resources will change over time, so it’s good to revisit this every year or as circumstances change.

Your Options

Following is my perspective on the value or purpose of the various ways you can spend your resources to meet your goals. If you would like one-on-one guidance for creating your right mix, I welcome you to book a private lesson with me. Sometimes, private lessons are “couch sessions” that involve more coaching, talking, exploring than dancing and technical work.

Group Classes – Progressive

Best for: cohort experience, efficiency, community building

In progressive group classes, you learn a common language, repertoire, and technique with a cohort. They are designed to help learners progress through an intentional series of progressive skills and knowledge.

This has a social benefit with the added perk of having others to compare notes with and work on things together. In vernacular swing dancing, progressive group classes are a foundation of community development.

In terms of efficiency, this is the best option to get social, technical, and cohort needs met in one place.

Group Classes – One-Off

Best for: social experience, efficiency, community building, dance tourism

One-off or drop-in group classes are fun and social, including group lessons right before social dances. It’s a great way to become familiar with people, making it easier to ask for dances later. When experienced dancers join in, it’s a big help for community building.

From an efficiency perspective, these classes can introduce you to new concepts, helping you determine what you may want to pursue further, or may serve as useful review and practice.

Social Dancing

Best for: social experience, cohort experience, community building, dance tourism

Social dancing strengthens bonds among community members while exercising the skills learned together. For a vernacular (conversational and improvisational) dance like West Coast Swing social dancing is necessary to improve and to become a community member. For some, this will align with personal development goals.

Private Practice

Best for: personal development, competitive performance, efficiency, and dream catching

Regular, intentional, dedicated practice time (solo and/or with a partner) is necessary to consolidate skills and form new habits. It is efficient in the sense of being essentially free, but it also increases the ROI (return on investment) of group classes and private lessons. For competitors and dream catchers, it is non-negotiable.

Private Lessons

Best for: personal development, competitive performance, efficiency, and dream catching

Private lessons provide personalized direction, feedback, technical analysis and instruction, and progress mapping. They nip errors in the bud and can both support and challenge in ways that will benefit the individual. They also provide accountability.

Depending on your learning style and ability to regularly attend group classes, private lessons may be the most efficient means of progressing for some.

For competitors, private lessons provide efficiency by focusing on exactly what you need to improve your results.

For dream catchers, personalized guidance with someone who has been on the same journey is the best way to start.

Choreography Classes

Best for: cohort experience, personal development, dream catching

While West Coast Swing is primarily an improvisational dance, choreography classes can provide several benefits:

• Strengthen brain-body connection through repetition
• Embark on a project with a cohort, which can deepen social bonds
• Be introduced to the skills and habits needed to perform choreographed routines
• To go far, dream catchers will need to do choreographed routines so it’s never too early to start

Intensives (e.g. Bootcamps, WCS Keeners Club)

Best for: personal development, cohort experience, competitive performance

Intensives come in a variety of forms, including the WCS Keeners Club, two- to four-hour experiences at weekend events like Swing In Bloom, or multi-day bootcamps like Westie Bootcamp Canada, ESS Camp, choreography camps, and others.

As the name “intensive” suggests, this is a great choice for those who want to challenge themselves through deep-dive, intense learning experiences. Bonds with others can be strengthened through intense experiences.

Intensives require physical, mental, and emotional capacity. Some require greater financial and time investment.

Guest-instructor workshops

Best for: cohort experience, social experience, efficiency, community building

Community leaders sometimes bring guest instructors to teach workshops and workshop weekends. These are efficient opportunities to learn from professionals and Champions of the dance without the investment in travel. Participating in the workshops is a cohort experience and can help with community building because participation makes more of these events possible.

As a bonus, the social dancing at these weekends is often superior due to attendees who come from out of town to participate, and the opportunity to watch and dance with a pro or Champion.

weekend Competition & WOrkshop Events

Best for: everything

If your resources can manage it, I recommend participating in at least one weekend dance convention a year. In Ottawa, we are fortunate to have Swing In Bloom right here, and others in driving distance, including Montreal Westie Fest, Toronto Open (on hiatus in 2026), and Waterloo Ontario Open.

These weekends are blitzes of the fulsome West Coast Swing experience. The competition experience can only be had at these events.

Social bonding happens during the travel, room sharing, in workshops, competitions, and on the social dance floor.

A wide variety of learning from professionals is available in one place, including workshops, intensives, and private lessons. Exposure to the dance’s top leaders — the Champions — helps situate your learning and the local experience within the global community.

And, due to the variety and number of attendees, the social dance experience is unmatched.

You can (and should!) optimize your choices at a weekend event around what you want and need. A good rule of thumb is to prioritize any two of these over a weekend: workshops/learning, social dancing (which happens late night), and competing.

The World Swing Dance Council website provides a calendar of these events around the world.

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