COMPETITION DETAIL

First comp - wasn't impressed. The productions team, the girls are way over worked... impressed with the dances, but my daughter was exhausted and it geared her away from it. Not enough trophies. Biased company

Dated competition, bad customer service, never enough trophies/medals

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This was by far the WORST competition I have ever been to. There was a last minute venue change (moving from Youngstown to Akron). The venue was awful. There was not only no food or drinks available, the stage was very small. The competition did not put down any marley so the stage was slippery and unsafe. There was also no backstage area for the dancers. The judging was completely off all weekend -- many dances underscored. The awards were HORRIBLE and the most boring awards I've ever seen. They spent 20 minutes handing out "special awards." We could not hear the awards either. Many trophies were not handed out as they were "broke" in route. This should not happen. Some checks and title jackets also were not available. They ran out of program books. The scores were tabulated by hand and no computers were used to tally anything. There was no support staff -- the judges handed out all the awards, which caused a 20 minute break after every awards (moving even further behind schedule) so they could have a food break. The awards were messed up and mis-announced many times over the weekend. They combined some lower and advanced levels in one awards but no others. They only recognize category winners if there are 5 entries in that category. The plaques and pins also are not a true representation of the award earned as they say "gold/sophisticated gold or platinum/sophisticated platinum". There were clearly no rules at this competition. I would never attend this again and never recommend this competition. It ran as if it were there first competition ever. I have been to MANY competitions as both a dancer and dance mom in the past 20 years and this is by far the worst. If I could, this competition would get zero stars. Do not waste your time and money - it will not be worth it.

Staff was great!!! Had a wonderful time!!

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I love this competition. They are more of a feel good competition, giving children a gold or high gold for a dance that elsewhere would be a silver or high silver. Really a confidence booster for the children. Judges are pleasant and friendly!

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Always a very fun competition! As a teacher I love the two levels for the kids. It\'s nice because it allows the kids who do not dance everyday a chance to win and compete. The judges are hit or miss, we\'ve had times where I believe the judges are spot on but have had times where it seems like they are watching a different competition. The special awards is always very nice. For the recreational kids, it\'s a highlight of their weekend because it makes them feel special. The staff at sophisticated is always very welcoming and extremely helpful. They make the competition enjoyable and easy. We always look forward to sophisticated and would recommend it to any studio. Give it a try you won\'t be disappointed !!

Terrible!!!! 3rd year in a row, but will be the last, our studio left with NO AWARDS because this time the trophies were broken in transit and the pins came from a new company and didn\'t arrive in time, last 2 times they were \"shipped to the wrong venue\" we will not be going back again. also judges were all one genre dancers or experience and were not trained in all genres so critiques were basic and not helpful..

As a parent my daughter has been doing this Competiton for many years in the New Jersey area and year after year it seems to get better. I have seen this company grow with the times into a very professional and entertaining Competiton. Each year our studio looks forward to sophisticated as it is one of our mandatory comps. First off the judging is always well qualified and the special awards judge has a way with words that makes each dancer feel special. I like how he makes every award so personal. Now being a parent generally we don\'t get to listen to the critiques but our director says they are very informative. The staff at sophisticated is also very fun and helpful. It seems as though every year the person working backstage is very fun and helpful. This year was no different. Our director really enjoyed the young man back stage and said he was there to help with anything she needed. The MC was also very good but could definitely make things more fun. At this event they had a photographer who was way too expensive for the quality of product. As a parent I go to many comps and like how sophisticated has a purple theme. It\'s nice how everything ties together. I just feel as though they need to keep up with the times and get some better stage lighting like the bigger comps do. What I like about sophisticated is their trophies are very pretty and hey give out a lot of awards. Since they went to the two levels of competition our kids love it even more. They have a jr competitive and a sr competitive which helps the kids who do not have everyday to dedicate to dance get an award and pursue their passion for dance. The director really made a smart choice doing that. One problem we had was there were no trophies for the whole event! Now personally I understand problems happen and the director showed us what happened(every high score trophy was broken in shipping) but I just hope we will get them mailed in tim

We have been competing a very long time, we\'ve been to many different comps and I\'ve NEVER been prompted to put a bad review anywhere but our experience here was horrible. This was a 1 day competition (Sunday) that began for us early a.m. around 7:30 and didn\'t end until almost 11 or 11:30 pm. Never in my life have I been forced to suffer through so many special awards. Special awards are great but to spend 25 minutes of an awards ceremony before doing any adjudications or places ESPECIALLY on a school night is just completely ridiculous. Judge took her sweet time handing out what had to be 10 to 12 special awards at each ceremony including the one that began at 10:30 that night. She gave personal critique and made small talk with the kids while everyone was exhausted and just dying to get out of there. The announcer basically had no clue what was going on. There were times when nobody was on stage, nobody knew who was waiting to go, confusion about who got what award, studio names mispronounced, kids\' names (EASY & COMMON NAMES) mispronounced. Even scoring and judging just seemed off. It was a joke. To top it all off the \"program\" looked like it was run off on a xerox machine and we were charged $10 for it. There was nothing in the book about scoring, levels, etc. Our studio\'s recital program is nicer. All in all a horrible experience. I hope to never return. Forgot to add that we were told that the pins for the kids were on backorder in China, as well as some of the trophies. They ran out of certificates to hand out and the special awards judge gave out SO many special awards she was making \"crafty\" ones to hand out in their place. Who runs a comp and doesn\'t have the pins & trophies? My daughter is older and doesn\'t much care but the younger kids like to get their pins. The kids were dancing on the bare wood stage, not a marley floor. The kids were slipping & there were divots in the stage covered with duct tape I wish I could give negative stars.

Although the judging system seemed fair and the backstage staff was very nice, the organization of this competition needs some serious assistance. Backstage was communicating to the DJ/MC by crouching down and peeking past the main curtain, some awards were announced incorrectly and dances didn\'t perform according to the schedule that was sent out. These were some small adjustments that need to be made but the worst part about this competition was the awards ceremony. Don\'t get me wrong, I love when my kids get called out for something but each judge gave out about 15-20 minutes worth of special awards. The awards were listed to begin at 7:15pm and they didn\'t start until 8:30pm on a Sunday night. When awards began, it didn\'t seem as if they were in any type of rush to successfully complete them. Each judge took at least 15-20 minutes to give out their awards! We didn\'t get out of there until 10pm and on a school night, that is just not acceptable. It was only 1 day of competition!! How does an awards ceremony last for over an hour for only 130 dances or so?! Not happy about this and I would highly suggest some internal evaluation on how they can improve on this because it seems I am not the only person to complain about their lack of time management.

Very honest event. The scoring structure is nice with the two different levels and the overalls. Give every dancers a chance to have their individual talents recognized. Will definitely be going back.

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This competition was good not my favorite but not horrible either! Would go back!

Had a great experience at this competition. Love the two different levels and the overalls. The girls also loved that they gave out crowns.

3rd year competing at this competition. Did not like the Springfield location. The auditorium was really hot. The bathrooms were a mess. The food vendor cooking in the school was not desirable. The judging is fair. Good feedback provided. Wish you would change up your pins to differ from year to year.

Liked the two levels and how there was fair competition in each level. Nice judges with great special awards. Love how they give out many titles so there are more chances to win. Helpful when two dancers from the same studio are against one another. They have individual age titles as well as overall titles for larger age ranges. However did allow one studio who has a relationship with them to enter one dancer and changed the schedule so she could compete another day and still allowed her to enter the title competition. So even though everyone else in her title category competed Friday, she got to come Saturday and title awards were pushed back because of it. Not fair. However overall it\'s good, love the award pins and title jackets. Don\'t like how comments are still sent on tapes or CDs, very old school.

The staff was warm and accommodating. Things ran smoothly and slightly ahead of schedule. I do have to say that I think it is very unprofessional to have a judge on staff who\'s studio is competing. I also do not like that the awards given to groups did not denote exactly was was received.

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I liked the fact that they changed to 2 levels instead of the 4 they had previously. I thought the scoring was fair and consistent. They ran on time, with occasionally having to skip a number to go back to it because of costume changes. Awards were a little long each session, due to the special awards, but it really made those kids receiving those awards feel special, as the special awards judge really explained his reasons for the award directly with the dancer/dancers. The facility wasn\'t great, and the comp was small, but the schedule was nice, not super early or late each day.

I loved this competition! I have been competing here for about 4 years now. I am very glad that they switched to giving out pins instead of the dog tags. I love how there are so many titles! Lost more kids can win that way! The only thing I didn\'t like was that the soloists who competed friday didn\'t get their awards until saturday night. Because of this, many of them weren\'t there to receive awards.

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Love this competition. They give out tons of titles and have extra categories so more kids can win! Judging was very fair!

Found many dance numbers in the wrong categories. Not well organized and also found the judging comments did not match the scores given. The awards ceremony is way too long and truly wish they would upgrade from the paper system. Sorry just not a fan...

We have been going for many years,and it just keeps getting better. The staff is friendly, and the scoring is challenging but consistent. Judges give helpful critiques. The past couple of years they've been running early or at the very least ontime. We went to their Nationals in July. DD was on the Performance Team and had a great experience. The choreographers were great, the music was fun and appealed to all . The judging was fair. They now give critiques on flash drives. One suggestion would be to post regional and national results online.

Awful. We registered 80 routines and the cancelled the week of competition...after ignoring my calls for two weeks trying to get the schedule. Waste of time. Can I give zero stars?

A good early first competition for us. Positives: Seems to offer good talent, awarding of cash prizes, like that everyone is entered for title position based on score, not additional entry fees! Negatives: Disorganized in the distribution of schedules, still does everything by PAPER!! I will also say judging seems to be a hit or miss. We have done multiple years with fantastic judges, excellent critiques and then other years where we were disappointed with critiques due to a lack of commentary/beneficial notes.

Did this a few years ago & hated it. Didn\'t receive details until a couple weeks before comp. Lousy venue, wasn\'t well organized. MC talked about himself for far too long during awards. Glad SO never went back.

Least favorite competition ever. Poorly organized. Don't tell you where you'll even be competing until a week (or less) before the date. Do not answer emails (from the studio, even). Do not post any relevant info on website. Do not do overalls (if I pay $100 for a solo...I'd like to know how got 5th place) Title winner only. They split levels for scoring, but not for the high score. Not a fan. (also, you can "win" a place on their national showcase team, but it costs $500 to be on it)

Fair competition at best. It is organized but the judging is terrible. Critiques don\'t match scores. There structure of their levels needs to be re-worked. They are very difficult to get a hold of.

No major complaints. We do this every year and enjoy it. Sometimes the comments from the judges veer from critiquing the actual dancing,which is disappointing but otherwise it\'s a decent competition. The website is not up to date, and results are not posted online which is a minus for me.

I wish I could give it 2 1/2. I don\'t know why they have 4 levels when they don\'t give separate awards at the different levels or score them any differently. Friendly overall, nice presentation of special awards for the dancers.