Laura-Catherine Dawson grew up dancing tap, jazz, and ballet until age 12 when she began training exclusively in classical ballet under the direction of Jill Pelhan and Katya and Arkaidy Orohovsky. Her training includes Joffrey Ballet Theater’s intensive in NYC, American Ballet Theater’s intensive in Austin, Texas, and International Ballet Competition in Jackson, MS.
Her dance teaching career began in 2012 at a local dance studio. Later, in 2015, she partnered with a local not-for-profit food pantry community center to start free ballet classes for the children. That class, which she called Leaps of Faith, shifted her previously set-in-stone career path for one which required much more risk and dependence on God. After she graduated from the University of Southern Mississippi she moved to Dallas, and the ballet program ended. Then in 2019, Laura-Catherine moved back to Mississippi and restarted the ballet program, but this time as its own independent nonprofit.