Inspire Dance Team, a program for dancers with disabilities, held its first recital in December and is currently planning a second one for the spring. Courtesy Alison Schrager 
Middletown resident Katarina Lengyel founded Inspire Dance Team to bridge the gap she saw in arts programming for people with disabilities. Courtesy Alison Schrager
By Elizabeth Wulfhorst
MIDDLETOWN – Katarina Lengyel, 24, a Middletown resident, has been dancing competitively most of her life. “Basically, I grew up as a dancer,” she said. So much so that she minored in dance at the University of South Florida while getting her bachelor’s degree in accounting.
Lengyel grew up with a cousin – and next-door neighbor – with an unbalanced chromosomal translocation, a genetic error in which a chromosome segment is lost or gained, resulting in extra or missing genetic material. In high school at Middletown South, Lengyel became best friends with Brianna Knapp. “She has Down syndrome, and she loved to dance. That’s what we bonded over.”
She credits these relationships with her involvement in her school’s special education program and working to make “everyone feel included,” she said. As Lengyel got older, she realized the “big gap” in arts programming for people with disabilities, especially in dance.
To fill that need, Lengyel created the Inspire Dance Team, a program for individuals with disabilities who love to dance but may find it difficult to keep up in a traditional class.
She noted that most dance programs are fast-paced and challenging, preparing students for competition. In high school, Lengyel spent about 25 hours a week dancing at Jersey Shore Dance Academy. “I would say that was my part-time job when I was in school,” she said with a laugh. She had to learn 10 different routines for each competition across various dance styles, including ballet, jazz, lyrical and contemporary.
Most programs, she said, don’t focus on making sure class members are keeping up. “I’ve stepped into so many classes that were so difficult I just wanted to leave,” Lengyel said.
She wanted to make sure her classes had a similar format, but focused more on the individual, “challenging them in a way that they can fully embrace it and also find creativity and expression.”
One of her students, Middletown resident Catie Schrager, a former classmate of Lengyel, currently attends Inspire classes. She said she started dancing when she was young. “I just feel like myself when I’m performing,” Schrager said. “It helps me get my emotions out.”
Alison Schrager, Catie’s mother, said the Inspire Dance Team fills a void for individuals like her daughter. “Everything’s about competition. Gotta win a medal or a trophy, right? And Catie doesn’t care about that.” Alison said. “Catie just wants to dance.”
“And that’s where Kat came in,” she said.
Lengyal started Inspire while still in high school but had to pause the program when she attended college. After getting her master’s in accounting at NYU, she picked up where she left off. In December, the program held its first recital, a holiday show; they are planning to hold another recital in May.
The dance class meets weekly at Jersey Shore Dance Academy, which Lengyel said has been kind enough to donate the space. The long-term goal is for Inspire, a certified nonprofit, to have its own space and be run by individuals with disabilities. The program currently has nine students, aged 13 to mid-30s and is continuously enrolling new students.
Catie said the instructors are “very good at helping us become friends” and at showing people that individuals with disabilities are capable of dancing as well as anyone.
Alison said the best part of the program is the sense of community it creates. Her entire office came to the holiday recital to support the students and will be turning up for the spring recital too.
While Lengyel and fellow instructors Brianna Dean and Allie Ennis, both volunteers, choreograph the group numbers, the students are encouraged to choreograph their individual routines. The instructors are there for guidance and to offer suggestions when the dancers have questions, but no one is faulted for changing routines and making missteps; it’s all a part of the learning process.
“I appreciate Kat so much,” Catie said. “Since we’ve been friends, we’ve always talked about dance and I feel like she’s helped me become a better performer and dancer.”
Catie danced ballet to “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy” in December but plans to perform a Rockettes-type routine for the spring show.
“It makes me feel good. I know people are watching me when I’m on stage and they’re clapping, that it’s genuine.”
The article originally appeared in the January 29 – February 4, 2026 print edition of The Two River Times.
