While many students at Tyrone are celebrated for their athletic skill, students who excel at non-school sponsored athletics and activities don’t always get the recognition they deserve.

One such student is senior Dakota Cowfer, who’s talent and love of dance goes beyond just an extra-curricular activity.  In fact, he hopes to make a career of it.

“After graduation I’m moving to Los Angeles [to pursue a career in dance],” said Cowfer, “if I don’t do it I’ll regret it, because you don’t know what can happen out there. They are always looking for new people.”

“My ultimate goal is to be noticed and have a career dancing for famous pop acts that use hip hop dancers on tour or in music videos, acts like Usher or Beyoncé,” said Cowfer.

“I want to go to college but I’m completely undecided on a career, so I’m just going to go for it and try to make it big,” said Cowfer.

It was Cowfer’s younger sister who first  inspired his love of dance.

“My sister was dancing and my mom thought that I would enjoy it too, so she encouraged me to give it a try,” said Cowfer.

Cowfer began his dancing career at age twelve at Segal’s School of Dance in Altoona.  From there he moved to Cheer Factor in Altoona and then he joined the Wolf Pack in State College to focus on competing in hip-hop team competitions.

For Cowfer, dancing allows him to express himself in ways he ordinarily would not.

“I’m generally a shy person, so I dance to be someone that I’m not,” said Cowfer, “When I dance it gives me a chance to come out of my shell and really express myself.”

Last spring Cowfer and his State College dance team attended “Worlds,” a major international dance competition at Disney World in Orlando, Florida.

As the name suggests, competitors travel from all over the world for this competition.  It’s one of the largest in the nation.

According to Cowfer, the Worlds competition is also one of the most elite, to get there you have to be the best of the best.

“It’s a privilege just to be able to go,” Cowfer explained.

One of the biggest challenges Cowfer faced at the competition was being a member of a smaller team of only five dancers.

The common size of the teams competing at the World competition is around 20-40.

“You have to be more sharp and more on your game when you have a small team, you can’t hide anything like you can when you have a team of forty people,” said Cowfer, “and having a small team is hard because your mistakes are more visible and you look less synchronized than larger teams.”

But Cowfer loves the added pressure of competing over simply performing.

“Competing is completely different than performing in a dance school”, according to Cowfer. “Going to competitions you become more comfortable being on stage because you’re doing it all the time. It really inspires you to go the extra miles to be better.  You’re in front of different audiences all the time.  Every time you do it its like the first time.”