TAMPA, Fla. — The Patel Conservatory at the Straz and Next Generation Ballet’s summer intensive program capped off another successful session.

So, congratulations are in order for the students graduating, of sorts, from the prestigious program.

It includes students from all over the world and features prestigious guest artists as instructors, along with the staff at the Straz.

They found inspiration in their art, and they also found a place to call home.

One of the students, Samuel Mateo Avila Bohorquez, is ballet dancing with the best.

“I’m from Colombia. I’m a 15-year-old professional ballet dancer,” Avila Bohorquez said. “And right now, I’m here at Next Generation Ballet, really excited.”

He joined others from Brazil, France, Puerto Rico, Uruguay, New York, Los Angeles — a world showcase of dancers.

The learning at Tampa’s Patel Conservatory at the Straz got intense.

“So, learning every day about dance. It’s really important to me because it pushed me to become a better dancer and a better person,” Avila Bohorquez said. “So, it pushed to learn many things about every class.”

Guest instructors said the program also pushes students to get to the next level of their growth.

“Push them a little bit further beyond what they do at their normal home studios, wherever they come from, internationally or nationally,” said Seth Belliston, a visiting instructor from Los Angeles’ Colburn Dance Academy. “And push them to the next step of their dance evolution.”

It is his fifth year doing the program at the Straz.

Like Avila Bohorquez, who started dancing when he was 4 years old, Belliston has danced most of his life and said he knows what the students can get from the experience.

“It’s fun because in the room — with different backgrounds, culturally, artistically, dance styles even — they have all sorts of different ideas that they’re bringing in,” Belliston said. “So, the dancers and students can see one another, and ‘Oh, that’s how you do it there. This is how we do it,’ and they blend all together, and it just becomes an inner inspiration between the students and then through the entire classroom.”

Next Generation Artistic Director Antonio Douthit-Boyd explained another benefit of the summer intensive.

“I remember when I was a student and doing summer intensives at San Francisco Ballet or at the Joffrey Ballet, I met some of the friends that I still carry with me to this day,” Douthit-Boyd said. “This is one of the best times to meet lifelong friends.”

Avila Bohorquez said he also found a place of belonging.

“I love Colombia. I love my academy, my friends, my teachers. I love everything,” he said. “But I’m really in love with this place. I think Next Generation really is…uh…the people, the teachers all feel so familiar, so I think that I belong here.”

And that motivates him to continue mastering his art to one day inspire others in the audience.

Next up at the Straz, they are offering a free event in celebration of the Americans with Disabilities Act’s 36th anniversary.

Performers with special talents will perform starting at 7 p.m. Friday, July 24 at the Straz’s Rehearsal Hall.