Free to be you and me

The dance world can be an intense place full of judgment and high physical and mental demands on youth. The pressures to have “the dancers body” or to be a “beautiful ballerina” are all over the place and can be quite hard for some young dancers to deal with… and rightly so.  

So what can be done to promote positive feelings and positive dancers?

Pegasus has long been on a mission to promote the healthy dancer. The healthy dancer respects and takes care of their body. We encourage our students to connect to their own body and to embrace the differences that make us all unique. Each of us can bring a different quality to our dancing because of these unique attributes and it is our goal at Pegasus to make sure students learn to cherish themselves for whom they are.

We should all feel free to be ourselves whether we are in the dance studio, in the dance school or out in the world! 

Performance as an important learning tool

Every year at Pegasus we do a recital to finish off our season. It is a big event for us with hundreds of costumes, professional photographers and lots of parents, grandparents, friends and family in the audience watching out talented students showcase the choreography they have been preparing in the previous months. It is an exciting time but it can also be rather stressful, which may raise the question; what is this experience giving to my child?
Pegasus is built on careful philosophies that are focused on encouraging each student's self-esteem and developing life skills through the tools of dance arts. We strive for this everyday in our classes and the recitals are no different. To us a recital is a chance to celebrate (and show off a bit) the amazing progress that students have made during the year. It is also a time to develop the skills needed to stand in front of a group of people and perform, present, demonstrate, etc. What we hope our students take from recitals is the feeling that they should take pride in their hard work and feel confident to show it to a large group of people.
We know that this task is a hard one to achieve in our society that is continuously judging even our youth, so we appreciate all the work that our faculty, staff, volunteers and, of course, parents contribute to endorsing these lessons. Recital is our time to celebrate the Pegasus community! We can't wait to see you all in the next weeks as we prepare for our Junior and Senior Recitals. 

The Parent Toolbox: What you should ask when choosing a dance school

• What is the philosophy or mandate – Many schools focus on competitions, which endorses competitiveness amongst students, places a lot of pressure on younger dancers and often encourages provocative dancing in inappropriate costumes. Make sure the values you have in raising your children match the values of the school.
• Quality of studio – Sprung dance floors are crucial in preventing injuries in dancers. So when assessing the studio’s facilities make sure to ask if they have proper dance flooring. Change rooms, waiting rooms are other areas to look for.
• Staff – what qualifications do the teachers have? Do they make sure their staff is trained in first aid and CPR? Do they have a front desk employee during all classes in case of emergency?
• Hidden costs - The price of classes is one thing, make sure to ask about other costs such as recital costumes/tickets, exam fees and extra classes, uniform cost, etc.
• Trial class – always try a class before signing up, make sure that you and your child feels comfortable with the studio, staff and the class. Ask about the refund policy before signing up as well, sometimes kids change their minds.