Judith Sachs
JUDITH SACHS is Founder and Director of ANYONE CAN DANCE®, an adaptive movement program in Philadelphia, PA. Although she started her professional life on the stage, and then moved to the healthcare arena, she now combines these two passions. Her goal is to get everyone moving, whether in a chair or across the floor.
Judith’s programs inspire movement beyond what participants thought was possible. She posits that physical experimentation in a chair, wheelchair or walker can free a body from many restrictions and galvanize a group to work together on rhythm, grace and confidence. She is a certified Dance for PD® teacher in Philadelphia, currently teaching online.
In 2019, she piloted an innovative therapy program, CLOSE CONTACT for COUPLES® with PD in Portland OR, Cherry Hill, NJ and Philadelphia PA under a grant from Penn Medicine. In 2020, she was awarded a Parkinsons Foundation COE grant to work with improve partner communication with couples online, and in 2021, was awarded a second year in cooperation with both the Parkinsons Disease and Movement Disorder Center, Penn Medicine and the Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health, Cleveland Clinic, Las Vegas, NV. In 2022, she was invited to join the new Prime PD Parkinsons Fitness platform online as a teacher of qigong, balance and gait. In addition, she is part of the CenterStage Arts in Medicine program at Penn State Hershey Cancer Institute, dancing with patients and caregivers in the infusion suites.
Awarded Grants
2022
Window of Opportunity Grant (WOO)
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Overview
Judith Sachs (ACG ‘15; WOO ’18, ‘22) has been invited to share her movement work in collaboration with couples dealing with Parkinson’s disease at the Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health in Las Vegas. This grant will support with transportation and accommodations, as well as meal costs to work in collaboration with individuals for a week.
2017
Window of Opportunity Grant (WOO)
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Overview
Judith Sachs has the opportunity to attend The International Society of Gerontology World Congress, held this July in San Francisco. The Congress is the largest group of individuals working for the advancement of the elderly, and this year it features Age Stage, where those, like Judith, involved in fostering creative aging will speak and perform. Judith will take part in a variety of improvisatory sessions with them, and will also be able to network and expand the scope of her adaptive dance program and her founding group, National Council on Creative Aging, internationally.
2015
Art and Change Grant (ACG)
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Overview
Judith’s elder Yorkhouse Dancers (ages 70 to 87) will work with a group of younger dancers (ages 11-14) from Lori Lahnemann’s Philadelphia Dance Academy in a process of intergenerational learning and performing. Judith sees that society’s stereotypes patronize and exclude our elders, and she believes that this dance project will challenge mainstream assumptions about this population. Inspired by her own return to dance at 65 years of age, Judith studied adaptive dance and developed her own program for those using wheelchairs and walkers, and other elders with movement restrictions. Both groups will perform matching choreography, some designed by Lori and Judith, and some coming out of improvisational sessions with all the dancers. The project will culminate in public performances and talk back sessions.
Window of Opportunity Grantees" class="img-fluid" />
