Don’t know who is the mastermind behind the Dance Concert? Get to know dance teacher Jan Chandler!

Alex Edidin | Staff Reporter
Zoey Lieberman | Staff Reporter
Staff photo by Alex Edidin

Jan Chandler
CoA: What is your most embarrassing moment?
JC: I think I have had too many to count! […]
CoA: Usually the ones you laugh about are the best!
JC: Well I laugh at everything. I’m trying to think, […] maybe I have suppressed them. I am trying to think if there is something I did onstage here that I was embarrassed about. I remember falling down the stairs at Foothill and I had white pants on and I fell and ripped my jeans and blood was going down. Everybody was going “Are you okay” and I was going “I am fine.” I hated negative attention!

CoA: Any least favorite teacher stories / worst subject in school?
JC: Well I went to PALY. I did not like language because there are some people that are just good at it! At Cañada there was this little frenchman who had an accent and I could actually start speaking it and understanding it […] and this just shows you how much the teacher matters.

CoA: What was your first job?
JC: Actually, it was summer. It was a sport shop, on Oak Grove. I remember doing that.

CoA: Favorite TV show?
JC: Oooooh. Probably Modern Family. And Friends!

CoA: What is your guilty pleasure?
JC: Besides chocolate? Well I don’t feel guilty when I eat chocolate. At this point in my life I don’t know if I have guilty pleasures. Maybe doing a puzzle, I love doing puzzles. I wait until I have time, and then over the holidays [I can puzzle]. I always get the frame part done first, and then you kind of get on a role, and things are getting together and [eventually] you just have to [force yourself] to walk away.

CoA: What is your favorite song?
JC: Well I have to admit I was that theater kid. The musicals, my mom would get the record and I would have it memorized by the Sunday after I saw it.

CoA: What is your biggest mistake as a parent?
JC: I remember Courtney being in those walkers, and you had to go down the stairs. I covered everything I thought she would fall off, except the cement steps that went down to the basement. And she went down. She was okay but she got hurt and I was in tears. There are certain things you just think you have everything covered…

CoA: Funniest moment from your teaching career?
JC: I mean everyday. There are so many things that happen in here where you just fall on the ground laughing, and that is the pleasure of this class. So many dumb things can happen and you’re thinking “you did not just do that.” I mean the boys running at each other with yoga balls.