Across the country, both the pandemic and now the protests have hurt many businesses, forcing them to close. Many have had to go online and just try to make it through.
Lisa McCabe, an African American ballet teacher and business owner in San Marcos, shared with NBC 7 how both have affected her business and her passion to be a role model for her younger students.
She started the dance program and studio Lovely Leaps last year.
“We teach ballet, jazz, tap, hip-hop,” McCabe said.
The classes are virtual for now until California moves into the next reopening phase, but it also gives her a platform as a role model teaching her passion.
“You can be anything you want to be. It doesn’t matter what you are, you can dance and be Clara. Because my story was I could never be Clara in the Nutcracker because I was black,” McCabe said. “No one ever told me that, but because of my surroundings, that’s what I thought. And I want to cultivate the atmosphere, where you can be any nationality and you could be Clara.”
Exposure to diversity and inclusion at a young age, she believes, is important. So do her student's families, turned friends, like Heather Dahl-Hansen.
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“They just see a person and that’s what I want for them, is to love everybody,” said Dahl-Hansen.
