SCDT was founded in 1994 by Paula Vreulink and Susan Nalicat.

The Southern California Dance Theatre serves to encourage the people in the Greater Long Beach area to become involved in the performing arts through dance, choreography, stage performances, theater productions and arts education.

Since its inception the Southern California Dance Theatre has built up its repertoire to four annual stage productions representing classical story ballets, choreographic projects and children's performances.  In addition, with our lecture demos, SCDT visits over 80 Long Beach and Downey Unified Schools annually with programs appealing to ages Kindergarten through 12th grade.

Each summer SCDT hosts the Young Choreographers' Workshop, a four-week intensive course for dance students age 12 through 22.  A certain number of scholarships have been made available through a generous grant from the Long Beach Public Corporation for the Arts.

The Southern California Dance Theatre serves the Greater Long Beach community by making certain full-length and excerpt productions available at no charge.  Organizations who have benefitted from SCDT's productions include the County of Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services and Los Angeles Office of Education / Gain Program.