It has been a little less than 2 years since we started the OmniZouk program, our first progressive program for education in the partner dance of Brazilian Zouk.

OmniZouk grew from humble beginnings as a couple regular classes on a Thursday evening with the same 2 Instructors to a full-fledged program with 4 Levels, supplementary Solo Drills, and 10 Instructors employed to its cause.

Additionally, we’ve been piloting progressive programs for other styles of partner dance including our growing OmniSwing program.

We’ve learned so much in those 2 years and compiled all changes into a complete redesign of OmniZouk, aptly renamed “OmniZouk 2.0”.

This blog outlines OmniZouk 2.0 and the “Omni Ecosystem” that it sits within.

What is the Omni Ecosystem?

The “Omni Ecosystem” is the formalization of Omni’s offerings into 4 key “Pillars”: Weekenders, Ambassadorship, Retreats, and the Progressive Program.

Omni has been running Weekenders for almost as long as its progressive classes. These are weekend events, which attempt to provide our community with perspectives from some of the world’s best dancers and instructors to augment our local expertise.

In 2024, we plan to focus on specialty programming that complements our updated ecosystem and the specific needs of the Omni community (4-5 events). We also would like to run our first OmniSwing Weekender.

We’ve also created the Ambassador system for students to go beyond just taking class and volunteer in a work-trade format. The ambassador system is intended to eventually funnel into paid Staff positions (e.g. Instructor, etc.). A “Pathway to Instructorhood” will be a focus for 2024.

Lastly, we realize the community doesn’t exist solely from taking class and dancing together. We plan to develop our first Retreat (timeline TBD), which will give space for our community to gather more intentionally and develop more meaningful connection.

What is the “Progressive Program”?

The Progressive Program is a system designed to guide you from zero to expert in different social dancing styles.

Within the Omni Progressive Program, there are 4 tools that we intend to offer: a Leveled Course, Study Groups, Technical Drills, and Training Teams.

Our intent is to grow OmniZouk, OmniSwing, and programs for other styles to eventually offer these 4 tools.

The first tool is the Leveled Course (i.e. Level 1, Level 2, etc.), designed to provide the foundation for learning a partner dance at a self-guided pace. The Leveled Course will continue to blend vocabulary and technical concepts.

In OmniZouk 2.0, the Leveled Course is evolving from 4 to 5 Levels. Track topics and content are being shuffled around between Tracks and Levels compared to previous years based on instructor and student feedback. Our primary goal is to ensure that the content builds up at an appropriate pace level by level. The total Track count is going from 20 to 25.

The second tool is Technical Drills, a rebranding of the Solo Drills classes from 2023.

In OmniZouk 2.0, Technical Drills will consist of two tracks, a Foundational Zouk Drills class for those in Level 2 and 3 and a Head Movement Drills class for those in Level 4 and 5.

Lastly, we are planning two new components of the Progressive System for OmniZouk: Study Groups and Training Teams.

Study Groups will be free-form modules centered around topics of interest from students. In the past year, we’ve heard from our learners that the topics listed above are important to them. We plan to roll Study Groups out starting in January 2024 on a monthly cadence. At the half year mark (June 2024), we will evaluate their efficacy, content, and popularity to determine if they should move to a bi-weekly or weekly cadence.

Training Teams will integrate choreography, drills, and social dancing instruction in fast-paced, intensive environments. We plan to roll them out starting in June 2024 with prolonged seasons beyond our typical 4 week commitment.

What can I expect upon “graduating” from OmniZouk?

OmniZouk should be a curriculum you can always return to and learn continuously from. That said, as a guideline, to fully 'graduate', time to complete all programs (excluding Training Teams) is estimated between 2.5-4 years, assuming continuous enrollment.

Upon graduating OmniZouk, a student should:

Go to any Festival or Congress and keep pace in Intermediate and Advanced Zouk workshops around the world.
Be recognized as a comfortable & competent social dancer in any community around the world, including Brazil.
Have the tools, pathways, and empowerment to continue pursuing their individual dance goals including (but not limited to): competition, performance, marathons, and more!

OmniSwing and other programs for other eventual styles will have graduation outcomes inspired by the above, but appropriate to the culture of the dance style.

What does this mean for me as an OmniZouk student?

In the OmniZouk redesign, the majority of Track content has been pushed one Level up.

As such, every current OmniZouk student is receiving a conditional pass to the next Level. The condition is that they review the content of the previous Levels of the new OmniZouk curriculum and make sure to take lower level Tracks they may have a missed as a result of this redesign.

Starting in January, all assessments will be conducted based on the 2.0 curriculum. As such, it is highly recommended to take tracks that you may have missed as a result of the transition before you attempt to assess into the next level up.

How will assessments work for the new Omni Progressive System?

We are redesigning assessments to focus on concepts (e.g. traveling turns) more than vocab (e.g. bonus).

The new system will be rolled out in January for both OmniZouk and OmniSwing.

Is anything else changing for OmniSwing?

Not yet. The Omni Ecosystem outlines how all our progressive programs will grow eventually. At this time, OmniSwing is focused on completing the first cycle of Level 2 and launching Level 3, which is slated for February 2024.

What are the Omni Ecosystem and OmniZouk 2.0?