Review: Fernando Sosa World Mastery Program

5
403

 

If you’re involved in the latin dance community at all, you’ve probably seen ads on your Facebook or Instagram with big name dancers and instructors inviting you to find out more about their new project and have the opportunity to train with them.

An ad with Fernando Sosa (founder of Tropical Gem Dance Company), talking about his new project and an upcoming webinar where he would answer your questions about dance popped up on my Instagram one day and I registered for it, curious about what he had to say and the sell at the end.

What’s The Project?

I missed most of the webinar but I was there in time for the sell – the Sosa Style World Mastery program. I had heard of World Mastery before – the concept is like Master Class. If you haven’t heard of Master Class, it’s a platform where celebrities and experts in different fields give online classes. You can study cooking with Gordon Ramsey, voice with Christina Aguilera, writing with Malcom Gladwell and so on.

World Mastery is focused more on instructors learning someone’s syllabus and then teaching it in their own schools than individual enrichment. That was the big sell at the end of the Sosa webinar: The program would give you essentially a year’s worth of classes for your students and allow you to market yourself as teaching Sosa style.

Fernando Sosa ranks high on my list of favorite dancers and choreographers, so learning from him, even online, seemed worth it to me. I signed up for the program (more on the price later), and am about a third of the way through the 36 video series of the “Beginner” module right now.

A few years ago, I was skeptical about learning dance online. I thought that you couldn’t really get all of the details and important things, like connection and technique, if the class was not conducted in person. But learning to dance through media has been around for a while. There were books printed in the 19th century and earlier to teach ballroom dances. I found a pamphlet from the 1920s at my grandmother’s house that taught the basics of a few popular dances, complete with pictures of footsteps showing you the figures. There are endless VHS tapes and DVDs teaching all kinds of dance.

What’s Included?

With the prevalence and ease of learning dance online though, I’ve come around and have learned a lot from video tutorials.  So far, Sosa’s classes have been just as instructive and informative to me as an in person class, and I can go back and rewatch the lessons multiple times instead of just getting a combo video at the end of a class or workshop.

Each Sosa lesson breaks down shine footwork and partnerwork, with Sosa and his partner Tatiana explaining some of the usual mistakes that people make during each move and how to correct them. The videos run about 12–20 minutes long, which I like. It doesn’t feel like a slog to sit down and watch one, but Sosa and Tatiana pack a good amount of material into a short video. When I go and teach the lesson to my class, it usually takes about an hour to cover everything.

I have had my own syllabus for a while, but I’m enjoying the new material and giving my teaching a makeover. I really appreciate Sosa’s method – his classes have a clear and logical progression that emphasizes repetition of concepts while adding new things to keep students excited. He also adds a lot of teaching tips that add dynamics to the class. He stresses the importance of constantly asking your students questions to reinforce the lessons, e.g. quizzing students on the count that a lady should step forward on a cross body lead. He also recommends singing the steps as you call them instead of just counting “1-2-3, 5-6-7,” which makes the class more entertaining and helps the auditory learners retain the information.

The classes are in Spanish with English subtitles, so I’m also learning a lot of new Spanish vocabulary words. (Equilibrista is tightrope walker for the non-Spanish speakers)

Are The Classes Worth It?

The program requires an investment of time, energy and money.  It’s not the cheapest way to learn, but for me anyways, a larger monetary investment makes me take it very seriously. I’m spending time watching the videos, taking notes, practicing and teaching the lessons to my students.  I’m treating it like I would a college course and I’m a little too excited that once I’ve paid for all the lessons, I’ll get a diploma signed by Sosa.

This is my experience so far with the World Mastery as a current instructor. I could see it benefiting an aspiring instructor or a dancer who wants to ‘deepen their practice’ – to borrow a phrase from the yoga world. I know a lot of people who have gone through yoga teacher training programs with no intention of teaching afterward.

I could also see that this would not be for everyone and like anything, it’s not perfect. It’s expensive – I’m not sure the actual price because World Mastery has all kinds of deals and promos, but you’re looking at at least the cost of a credit hour or two at an American university. It requires self-discipline and motivation, especially if you’re doing it by yourself and don’t have a partner. There’s no interaction with the teacher, so if you have questions that are unanswered in the videos, they will stay that way. There’s also no interaction with other students in the program, so you do feel a little isolated.

But on the whole, it’s working for me and if you’ve seen the World Mastery ads on social media and are curious about the concept, hopefully this answered some of your questions.

P.S. Terry, I’m waiting for your World Mastery program!

5 COMMENTS

  1. Guys,

    I don’t know specifically about Fernando Sosa’s course, but I assume it’s similar for the other dance instructors on the site. The following is the information I received
    regarding pricing for the World Mastery Course of Alberto Valdes.

    Here is how it works (I assume it will work the same way for all the other instructors like Adolfo and Fernando Sosa, Ataca y Alemana, etc)

    You choose which level you are. There are 3 levels: beginner, intermediate, advanced

    Each level has a total of 36videos. The videos are delivered piecemeal (4 videos per month) or you can choose to have all 36 videos sent to you at once. Price will be the same either way).

    Each video has enough material for 1.5 hours of learning according to the rep.

    So let’s say you choose Advanced. I only inquired about the advanced syllabus pricing, so beginner or intermediate pricing may differ

    You pay 219euros every month for 9 months. So that amounts to 1,971euros total for all 36 videos at the advanced level. If you also want the beginner or intermediate syllabus, I assume the price is just multiplied.

    However, currently there is a promotion going on where the first month is 49euros and every month thereafter is 99euros. So the price is actually 841euros total.

    You can also opt-in to receive all videos at once for the same price

    So there you go.

    I was expecting the course to run 500euros. I am sure no one actually buys at full price (1,971 euros is insane!).

    I am sure the promotion is the Real price… (a common marketing tactic)

    I didn’t inquire about the price in a specific currency. . It was just given to me in Euros, which makes me think there is no option to pay in USD.

    So those are the ballpark figures you’d be looking at for a subscription for World Mastery.

  2. I’m also interested in knowing the prices for such classes.. I just so the ads on facebokk today and I was a bit curious 😉

  3. I really need a ballpark figure on the price before I decide on this. Can you tell me how much you paid and for how many hours of teaching ?

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here