By JON BAKER

SEEKONK — When Shannon (O’Brien) Marshall opened a modest dance studio on Attleboro’s Rice Street way back in 1992, at the tender age of 19, she never envisioned her students someday attaining international status.

Fact is, however, this 35-year-old former dancer and Tolman High School graduate has groomed a truly special group of localites — she calls them “sort of like daughters” — and trained them into qualifiers for the International Dance Organization’s World Jazz Cup/Modern Championships, slated for Dec. 12-15 in Mikolajki, Poland.
During the late-morning hours of Wednesday, Dec. 10, these 10 young collegians and high schoolers, all hailing from the Shannon O’Brien School of Dance, will hop into a bevy of vehicles for Boston’s Logan Airport. Once there, they will begin an approximate 9,000-mile trek to Europe as representatives of the USA National Dance Team, which consists of 19 others hailing from  Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania and points west.
They will compete against squads from at least 40 other countries in three assorted jazz/modern classes
“I’m so honored my girls have come this far; I never thought it possible,” stated Marshall, who now runs two studios — one on Newman Avenue, the other on Brook Street — with help from Julie Casamas-White, not only her fellow co-director/instructor but also her sister.
“I used to be happy just to have enough tuition fees to pay the rent and the rest of the bills.
“Now we have two locations, a waiting list for students and a host of world-class dancers,” she added with a giggle. “It’s unbelievable how far they’ve come.”
The list of dancers heading to Poland late this fall include Pawtucket residents Courtney Asselin (20 years old), Mikayla Kolb (20), Kelsey Fournier (19), Kelsey Ahmed (17), Alyssa Lubera (17) and Elyssa Cipriano (16); Stephanie Beaudoin (20) of Central Falls; Katie Rei (19) of North Providence; and Caitlyn Shepard (18) and Julia Neto (14) of Attleboro.
These young women, most of them Marshall’s students since age three, qualified for the event in Poland at the USA National Dance Team Championships, conducted at Boston’s Hynes Convention Center on July 3.
“We were hopeful going into Nationals, but also cautious,” Marshall explained during a recent training session. “I knew we had a strong group of dancers, but I also knew there were going to be a lot of other extremely talented people competing.
“When you get to that level, everybody isn’t just good but excellent,” she added. “It was obvious that everyone had phenomenal training and technique, so I kind of figured it would come down to performance value -- that is, entertainment value and emotional execution, how much they threw themselves into their performances.
“The top three placements earned the trip to Worlds, and the worst part was waiting for the scores. It was pretty stressful. When a category had been completed, all the teams had to stand on the stage and wait to see the scores they received. The judges didn’t announce them in order, like ‘Fifth place goes to …., Fourth place goes to’ … so that was tough. Julie and I were in the audience thinking, ‘What have we got ourselves into?’ That’s how high the stress level was.”
Turns out, her students manufactured outstanding performances.
In the Adult Modern category, the six-person unit of Asselin, Fournier, Kolb, Beaudoin, Rei and Brittany Ahmed, 20, of Pawtucket finished first, while Neto, the “baby” of the team, placed third in the Junior Soloist/Jazz division.
Two separate squads also gained access in the Adult Jazz category, with the sextet of Asselin, Fournier, Kolb, Beaudoin, Rei and Brittany Ahmed winning, and the team of Kelsey Ahmed, Cipriano, Lubera, Shepard, Asselin and Kolb taking runner-up laurels.
Casamas-White, a 28-year-old professional dancer from Cumberland, now acting as a professor of ballet at Franklin’s Dean College, will perform in Brittany Ahmed’s place at the Worlds, as the former has accepted a job at Disney World. She also had provided the choreography for all routines.
Marshall noted her sister’s addition is perfectly legal, as her performances will take place within open/adult divisions.
“When the scores were announced, and we found out we were ‘in,’ we were shocked,” Marshall grinned. “I couldn’t believe it had actually happened … This honestly is the Olympics for dancers worldwide, and to qualify is huge. What a lot of people don’t understand is that dance is an art form. It’s not a sport. This is as high as we can go. This is as elite a competition as there is on Earth, and we’re ecstatic to be going.”
There is, however, a problem. No one is quite sure how they’ll afford the trip. Marshall estimated the cost for the team of 12 to fly overseas at $800 per person and five nights at the famed Hotel Golebiewski (near the Russian border) at $300 per at $13,200. As of Wednesday, the contingent had raised just under $1,500.
“Our original goal was $12,000, but whatever amount we can raise, we’ll gladly take,” Marshall said. “We’ve set up a lot of fundraisers, like a pasta dinner (scheduled for Sunday, Sept. 21 at the South Attleboro Knights of Columbus Hall at 2 and 6 p.m.); a “Mom’s Night Out” babysitting service to take place at the Brook Street locale in September, October and November; and a few others,” she said. “We’re going to try to raise as much as we can on our own.”
Cipriano, like Kelsey Ahmed and Lubera a senior-to-be at the Jacqueline M. Walsh School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Pawtucket, admitted she’s saving as much as she can for what she called “the trip of a lifetime,” doing so as an employee at a South Attleboro fast-food eatery.
“Everything I make is going into savings for this flight,” she said. “My main goal was to qualify for the World Championships, and it seems like a dream. It seems so surreal, but we’re more focused on fundraising right now.”
Added Ahmed:  “I think we’re more worried about getting there than competing. We won’t worry about what we have to do there until we’re in Poland. Once we see the other teams and what they’re doing, then the nervousness will set in.”
Asselin, a Rhode Island College sophomore-to-be on a “full-ride” dance scholarship, claimed she was proud to represent her country at such an important event.
“These are like our Olympics,” she said. “It’s amazing that we all qualified, considering a lot of us started together at such a young age. We’ve been dancing and learning together for such a long time. I remember when we were little and we were tripping over each other. Still, this has been a dream of ours, and now we’re realizing it.
“Now all we need to do is get there,” she continued. “We’ll be ready once we do.”
To donate to the team’s cause, one may send a check payable to the Shannon O’Brien School of Dance, 21 Brook St., Seekonk MA 02771 or call the studio at (508) 761-6394.