In recent years, Seattle Prep’s dance team, PULSE, has become a popular performance piece at school activities and assemblies.  Since its formation over six years ago, PULSE has gained many members and their audience has expanded just as much as the team.

Although PULSE mainly focuses on hip-hop currently, captains like Bridget Simmonds are looking to broaden their repertoire to incorporate other styles of dance. Bridget, a junior and second-year captain, is even taking a choreography class outside of school at Velocity Dance Center to ensure the desired progress will be made within PULSE’s dance stylings. In this Youth Dance Collective class at Green Lake, she has gained the understanding that choreography is all about creating, collaborating and perfecting a dance routine. A new range of techniques have come into her knowledge from participating in this class as well. Bridget says she has learned to trust in her instincts more with dance, “Nothing is off the table in choreography.”

She hopes to insert different contemporary styles of dance in addition to more advanced and polished formations to their hip-hop roots. PULSE’s choreographer agrees with anticipation for it becoming “a band of dancers bringing all of their strengths into one team.”

Besides their junior captain, PULSE also has two senior captains, Alex Morales-Garcia and Desiree Simmons. Alex expects to continue her dancing career in college and has been on PULSE since her freshman year. Over the course of those three years, she has noticed an increase in members and student leadership. In gaining new dancers and leaders, there is now some division of the dancers among the five captains. However, Sam Eco, sophomore captain, comments, “Pulse is all about coming together and getting to know each other. We’re definitely a family.”

Her fellow sophomore captain, Caroline Lambert, mentions how the new dancers are fun to teach and everyone gets to do what they love. Bridget Simmonds also admires PULSE’s supportive and accepting qualities that make it such an open outlet for dance.

In the future, PULSE plans to not only incorporate more modern styles of dance, but also polish up routines and add in formation changes within a song. Entering some dance competitions in the area is also an aspiration for many members. Another plan is to integrate a greater sense of service within the team. With such spirit and passion, PULSE has the potential to accomplish anything these dancers set their mind to. They prove to be a team with One Body, One Rhythm, One Beat, One PULSE.