Samantha Tetzlaff-Rush

Miss Samantha started dancing with DFX when she was 11 yrs old. Her passion, talent, and hard work as a dancer paid off and she became an assistant teacher at 14 and had her own hip hop classes at 15. Miss Samantha always produces fantastic creative choreography and is passionate about sharing the results with the world.

Many of Miss Samantha’s students have achieved top marks in their exams with some of them being the top marks at their respective levels across the country. She herself has passed exams in Hip Hop and Jazz with impressive results including the top Hip Hop mark in NZ for Intermediate 1 Hip Hop in the BBDS Syllabus.

Miss Samantha is a qualified Acrobatic Arts teacher and continues to attend workshops and courses to upskill and keep her dance knowledge current. Miss Samantha has also choreographed many exceptional performance routines for our competition squad dancers in past years and is dedicated to getting the best out of her students.

After a year away from DFX Miss Samantha got married to her wife Cat and has returned to DFX to teach Acro and senior Jazz classes. We are thrilled to have Miss Sam back on the DFX team this year.

Miss Samantha’s teacher philosophy. “In my dance classes I strive to create a safe space for all dancers to express themselves in their most real and authentic form, feeling the freedom to be who they are in that very moment through movement and music, to have a fun time doing it and to let go knowing they can without judgement. Allowing my students to feel seen and understood, and to feel looked after is so important to me. Listening to them verbally or watching and understanding them through their movement, to know what they need from me as their teacher so they can continue to thrive and enjoy themselves. I will always be their biggest cheerleader. I find myself talking a calm/relaxed approach towards anything in life and I pull that into each dance class hoping to share that energy with my students allowing for an easy, stress-free environment without the pressure to be perfect and learning to forgive themselves when making mistakes. I believe in empowerment and supporting each other’s successes, so I really love to share that by giving dancers a hi5 to recognize their hard work.”