Congratulations to Kara Clancy of Clarendon Hills and Sofia Siracusa of Hinsdale for placing in the Mid-America Irish Dance Championships recently held in Chicago.  The girls are members of the Trinity Academy of Irish Dance.

Kara is a 5th-grader at Prospect School in Clarendon Hills.

Sofia is a 5th-grader at The Lane School in Hinsdale.

Dancers from Trinity Academy of Irish Dance placed high at the Mid-America Irish Dance Championships, held Nov. 26-28 in Chicago.  Coming in at the top was Erin Gentile of Downers Grove who took fifth place and is now qualified to compete in the 2011 World Championships to be held in Dublin, Ireland from April 17-23.

School wide, Trinity had a record breaking 16 gold medal placements in solo and team competition, more than twice the number of gold medals for any other school.  As the Mid-America Championships is the qualifying round for the World Championships, Trinity now has 44 dancers who are qualified to compete at the Worlds in solo competition in 2011, another first for the Mid-America region.  Of those qualifiers, 88% placed in the top ten and 77% placed in the top five. 

"We're known for being an internationally renowned team school, but the solo results both local and internationally have surged in the last several years," said Trinity Founder, Mark Howard. It's an exciting time for us because the adjustments we have made in the way we teach are paying dividends for our students."

Howard added that the compeitition didn't bring the results for some of Trinity's dancers that they had hoped, but the losses were just as important because of the life lessons that came with them.

Here's a look at a few area residents who placed well in the competition:

• Maeve Meier of Downers Grove took 15th place out of 117 competitors.  She is also qualified to compete at the World Championships. 

• Kara Clancy of Clarendon Hills took 19th place out of 84 competitors in solo competition and took silver with her team.
• Sofia Siracusa of Hinsdale took 21st place out of 84 competitors in solo competition and took silver with her team.
• Margaret Brewick of LaGrange Park took 23rd place out of 115 competitors in solo competition and took gold with her team.
• Hannah Dutler of Countryside took 34th place out of 145 competitors and took fourth with her team.
• Emma Evans of Garfield Ridge took gold with her team.
• Meghan Cooper of Western Springs took fourth place with her team. 

Thanks to Christa van Baale for this announcement!