GIRL POW-R Founder to Launch Pop Star Performance Academy in Canada
Dawn Van Dam built GIRL POW-R from an audition of one hundred girls into a JUNO-nominated touring act.
The founder of the JUNO-nominated group GIRL POW-R has launched the Pop Star Performance Academy, a training program billed as Canada's first school designed to teach children the skills behind live performance. Dawn Van Dam, who serves as founder, executive producer, and creative force behind GIRL POW-R, built the Academy around the idea that singing, dancing, acting, and stage presence can be taught rather than relying on natural talent alone.
For nearly a decade, GIRL POW-R has proven that young performers given real training and real stages can accomplish extraordinary things, earning a JUNO nomination, more than 450 live shows, and streams in 240 countries around the world along the way. Now, the JUNO-nominated group's founder is opening that same system to every child, launching the Pop Star Performance Academy, a first of its kind school built around the belief that singing, dancing, acting, and stage presence are not innate gifts but trainable skills, and that any young performer, given the right guidance, can learn to own a room.
The Academy was built by Dawn Van Dam, the founder, executive producer, and creative force behind GIRL POW-R, whose own path into youth entertainment began when she started auditioning talented young singers to build an original pop group rather than assume musical chemistry would simply happen. From that first audition of one hundred girls, Van Dam built a group that would go on to make history as one of the first young acts nominated for a JUNO Award in the Children's category, tour extensively across Canada and the United States, and accumulate more than 2.2 million streams worldwide. That experience, and the systems she built to scale it, now form the backbone of a training program designed to give any child access to the kind of coaching that once existed only inside the group itself.
'We're not just inviting families to join our training program,' said Van Dam. 'We're inviting them to be part of a life changing experience.' That philosophy runs through every level of the Academy, from the Little Sparks program for toddlers as young as eighteen months to the Supernovas level for performers aged fourteen and up who take on leadership and mentorship roles. Along the way, students build the skills of a true triple threat, supported by an approach grounded in the idea that singing itself is a motor skill developed through breath control, muscle memory, and ear training rather than a talent some children simply lack.
Much of what sets the Academy apart is its instructional bench, led by industry professionals with credits spanning Tokyo Disneyland, Broadway, Eurovision, and Canada's Got Talent. Vocal coach Joseph Spitale, a former Tokyo Disneyland mainstage singer and graduate of both the University of British Columbia and New York's American Musical and Dramatic Academy, has coached national champions and current GIRL POW-R members alike. Producer and composer Jovan Jovanov, whose songs have surpassed one hundred million YouTube views and represented Macedonia at Eurovision, works alongside choreographers and performers including JUNO-nominated GIRL POW-R member Carina Bianchini, giving students direct access to the same creative team behind the group's original music.
Students train using repertoire built for genuine cultural relevance, including exclusive choreography and vocal work from the global hit songs of KPOP DEMON HUNTERS alongside music from Taylor Swift, Ariana Grande, Lady Gaga, and Mariah Carey, plus original JUNO-nominated GIRL POW-R material. The Academy's GIRL POW-R Pathway offers advanced, audition-based training for performers ready for bigger opportunities, including selected auditions with a Disney casting director and connections to U.S. talent agents, while its Training Pathway builds foundational confidence and stage experience for newer performers working toward that next step.
Beyond performance technique, the Academy is built around a values-based mission that Van Dam has carried since GIRL POW-R's earliest days. Each student is encouraged to identify a social cause meaningful to them, from youth homelessness to mental health awareness, and to represent that cause in interviews and public appearances, turning stage time into a platform for something larger than performance alone. Kindness and collaboration are treated as core requirements of the program, with an explicit commitment to keeping the environment supportive rather than competitive in the way some traditional training programs can become.
With in person locations already open across the Greater Toronto Area and additional cities opening on a rolling basis, along with a globally accessible online training option, the Pop Star Performance Academy is positioning itself as a genuinely new model for youth performance education, one that treats confidence, resilience, and stage readiness as skills every child deserves the chance to build. Auditions for the GIRL POW-R Pathway's September intake are open now through August 15, with the Training Pathway welcoming new students on a rolling basis for families ready to start building those skills today.
Van Dam's own entry into youth entertainment began when she auditioned one hundred girls to assemble GIRL POW-R rather than leave the group's chemistry to chance, a process that eventually led to a JUNO nomination in the Children's category, extensive touring across Canada and the United States, and millions of streams worldwide. That experience now informs the curriculum of the Pop Star Performance Academy.
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