PS DANCE! | A Rally for Dance Education
Back in April, Governor Andrew Cuomo confirmed that schools across New York will remain closed for the rest of the 2019-20 school year.
Not long after that, Mayor de Blasio announced significant cuts to the city’s budget, with drastic reductions impacting arts and culture and the Department of Education. The Mayor created a new advisory council on Arts, Culture, and Tourism that DID NOT include a seat for a representative from our dance community!
What does this mean for dance education in our schools when we return?
If dance is cut from our children’s curriculum, there will be a ripple effect through the infrastructure of dance education on all levels. When there’s less demand for dance in the local classroom, there is less demand for intensive training and higher education for dance educators, as well as less support for artist educators in programs nationwide.
We’ve worked too hard, and we’ve made such incredible progress in supporting #danceforeverychild — we can’t stop now!
Our hope was that by watching and discussing our documentary together, we would call attention to the need to:
- Continue providing excellent training to dance educators so they can successfully teach online and come back to the classroom stronger than ever
- Inspire parents to advocate for dance education in their kids’ schools
We prepped for the Watch Party for about 2 weeks—we wanted everything to be perfect.
I put on my Director’s hat and led everyone through what should happen, and when. My all-star tech team, Amber and Ben, made sure the livestream ran smoothly, and my marketing team made sure our audience knew about the event with coordinated emails and social media communications.
What an incredible live event it was.
The engagement before, during and after the event was mind blowing, and the rally for dance education was beyond my wildest dreams.
It was very clear that people needed this. 💜
THANK YOU to the inspiring Dance Educators and Advocates who joined me in declaring #danceforeverychild: Erin Sullivan Lally, Joan Finkelstein, Ana Nery Fragoso, and Jody Gottfried Arnhold.
If you missed out on the event when it went Live, catch the replay here!!
Join The Movement
Support Dance Education in Every Public School!!
Did You Know: Only 3% of public schools nationwide have dance programs? If our film PS DANCE! inspires you to bring dance in your school, take the first step and join our movement. Together we can bring dance to every child!