Meet Our Team

Sarah Wideman
Program Director + Instructor
Hello, and thank you for being here! My name is Sarah and I am the mom behind YADCA. My family moved to Las Vegas in 2017 and upon arriving I began looking for classes and activities to participate in that fit my children's interests, which included sewing and cooking. When I found very little offered that fit what we were looking for, I got the crazy idea that I might be able to create a program myself, and thus the vision for YADCA was born.
I graduated from college in 2004 with degrees in Sociology and Music. I worked for several years with at-risk youth and homeless families, along with teaching piano and violin lessons on the side prior to becoming a full-time mom and eventually a full-time homeschooler.
Once I decided I was going to embark on the new adventure of creating YADCA, I realized I had a significant amount of work and learning to do, considering I had no background in business and was a novice on both the sewing machine and in the kitchen. I began consuming all things business and in early 2019 I completed a program in Holistic Nutrition to help provide me with a better foundation in the direction I wanted for our YADCA culinary programs. I have been very fortunate to find amazing professionals all along the way to help develop and refine our curriculum and teach our classes. YADCA officially launched in the Fall of 2019 and it has been a very educational journey, to say the least! While I have always preferred to be behind the scenes in running the business while our amazing instructors shine on the front lines, I have learned from early on the many challenges of being so dependent on others without having enough knowledge myself in the fields that YADCA teaches. When the quarantine hit and YADCA paused along with the rest of the world, I took the opportunity to go to culinary school and began being intensively trained by our sewing/design staff as we worked on preparing for the future of YADCA programs. Now, along with running the behind-the-scenes of our programs, I also assist in our Sewing + Design programs and am currently the primary instructor of our Culinary classes.
I cannot express enough how grateful I am to all the people who have helped YADCA become a reality and to so many in the community who have been and continue to be so supportive and encouraging of our efforts. You have been incredibly patient and understanding while we tackle the steep learning curve of a new start-up! We will continue to work hard and improve our programs and operations to better serve your families. An extra dose of gratitude goes to my husband and children as well, who continue to be my biggest cheerleaders and without whom YADCA would have never been born.
Thank you again for being here and we'll see you in class!

Maria Arceo
Sewing + Fashion Design Program Consultant + Instructor
My training and experience across several industries have brought me many amazing opportunities to work with other artists and share my knowledge as an educator. I have been in the field of fashion for more than thirty years designing and creating made-to-order wedding gowns and special occasion dresses. I have been working in the theater costume design for eight years now and was a part of the Wynn/Encore Las Vegas shows Le Reve-The Dream, and Steve Wynn's The Showstoppers as a senior costume tech. I joined the academe in 2002 teaching in the fashion design and fashion merchandising programs of several art schools and colleges locally and internationally- College of Saint Benilde School of Design and Arts, La Salle College International, International Academy of Design and Technology, Sanford Brown College, and the Arts Institute of Las Vegas. I have a masters degree in Learning and Teaching and am currently finishing my Phd in Career and Technical Education at UNLV. I am also a member of the Las Vegas Fashion Council and sit on its Education Committee Board.
Outside of teaching and creating, I like reading books and fashion magazines to keep current with the trends and news. I enjoy watching and playing a little bit of golf and tennis, and I adore my three grandchildren Bly, Beau, and Ena. To view a collection of some of my work, click HERE.