How can we honor and preserve history without repeating the same mistakes over and over? How can we reimagine classics to center a variety of voices and speak to diverse audiences—not simply to avoid offending anyone, but to actively invite and include everyone? How can we propel the dances we know into a new era, so they—and ballet—can flourish into the future?

When first-year students begin classes at the University of the Arts’ School of Dance in Philadelphia, they’re met with guiding questions that challenge them to reframe the very purpose of dance training: “How do you pay attention to what you’re doing all the time, differently?” asks Donna Faye Burchfield, professor and dean of the School of Dance. “What […]

Five College Dance, like the Five College Consortium, does more together than each institution could alone. The Consortium is a collaboration involving four liberal arts colleges (Amherst,­ Smith, Mount Holyoke, and Hampshire) and the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Most students major in dance seeking rigorous training and career-focused knowledge to succeed in the professional world. But the team at Marymount Manhattan College doesn’t just help students land their dream dance job—they give them the tools to create it. With a degree program unmatched in its flexibility, dance students at Marymount can craft a course of […]

This fall, the celebrated collaboration that grew out of that conversation, the joint Ailey/Fordham BFA Program, marks its 25th anniversary. Two and a half decades ago, the two institutions opened their doors to the first cohort of students that would receive conservatory-level dance training paired with a robust liberal arts education.

No matter how rigorous a curriculum, it’s difficult to create college experiences that truly simulate the day-to-day life of professional dancers. The School of Dance at Mason (George Mason University) in Fairfax, Virginia, however, is proving it’s possible. By the time dancers graduate from Mason’s BFA program, they will have participated in at least one […]

For many dancers, the right college path is a mixed one, where dance is one component in a combination of majors and minors. It’s a choice that allows them to explore diverse interests, discover unexpected intersections, and deepen their engagement and mastery on multiple fronts.

“I just kind of fell in love with the program,” says Rhoden,­ who has a long history teaching and choreographing in higher ed settings, including at New York University, The Juilliard School, University of California Irvine, Skidmore College, and the University of Mississippi. At Chapman, he says, there was “a great vibe in the studio and in the program and the people.”