Caitlyn Cobb, 29

The desire to teach a small group of girls dance has grown for Caitlyn Cobb into a dance school with 250 students and 23 staff that also offers music and ninja classes. It has spawned a nonprofit too.

Star Academy of Dance & Aerial Arts opened in 2019 after Cobb, who has been dancing since age 2, wanted to teach classes for four little girls who were friends of her family. Ultimately, those girls ended up not taking the class, but plenty of others did.

Photo by Mark Wemple

“It just exploded from there,” Cobb says. “I was really expecting it just to be one or two classes a week, and then it turned into four nights a week, and then more and more, and then COVID.”

During the pandemic, classes went virtual and then outdoors.

In the years since indoor instruction has returned, the academy has grown “exponentially,” Cobb says. Just this year, enrollment increased by 25% and profits went up by 40%, according to Cobb, who says a lot of students are taking more classes.

In the last two years, the school, which offers all kinds of dance from aerial to ballet to Irish to jazz, began offering piano and voice lessons along with “ninja classes,” essentially aerial arts for boys.

Cobb attributes her success to many things, including her staff, students and their families and notes the role the school plays goes beyond fancy footwork.

“Yes, we're teaching them dance,” Cobb says, “but also we're raising humans, teaching them kindness and how to encourage others.”

Word of mouth has played a part in the school’s growth, she adds, and so has demand.

“Our community desperately needed something for kids and something in the arts. There was not much for kids out here at all,” Cobb says of the Palmetto area where Star Academy of Dance & Aerial Arts is located. “There's a karate studio, a cheer place, and that's it. This area is growing but there's nothing for the arts, so just having that opportunity for kids, I think, has been huge.”

In January 2023, Cobb started Star Community Arts, a nonprofit that recently awarded $12,000 in scholarships for low-income students to take classes. It is also launching a Christian dance class open to all and a dance teacher-in-training program in partnership with Manatee School for the Arts and Manatee High School, Cobb says.

Accolades have begun rolling in for the entrepreneur and her business. Cobb was recently awarded the Manatee Young Professionals Entrepreneur of the Year Award for 2024 and was a finalist for the Manatee Chamber of Commerce Small Business of the Year in 2023.

The mentor she credits with helping her along the way is her mother, Christi Haley, who is also the director of development for Pace Center for Girls in Manatee County, a nonprofit that helps young women thrive. 

“She has shown me how to give back to others and contribute to our community,” Cobb says. “Through her example, I've learned that personal growth and community impact go hand in hand, creating a cycle of support and kindness that benefits everyone.”