Highschool can be stressful, and Uni is no exception; however, it can also be the activities students pursue outside of school that add to their stress. Dance is one of these demanding extracurriculars which several Uni students participate in.
Three of Uni’s seniors, who have been dancing since before subbie year, shared their experience of how they have learned to balance the two worlds throughout their time at Uni.
CJ Jung attends Art in Motion Dance Studio (AIM) and has been dancing for 9-10 years. At AIM, which allows students to explore several kinds of dance, Jung does competitive dance for Contemporary, Modern, Jazz, Tap, Hip Hop, and Ballet.
She says that it’s difficult to balance dance and school “because they’re both responsibilities [and] there’s just not enough time.” With 5-6 competitions, 2-3 conventions, and a recital to prepare for throughout each year, she spends around 30 hours at dance per week. This includes both classes and rehearsals Monday through Saturday. Jung also teaches dance to younger students and is the president of the AIM Student Council.
To manage her stress, she says, “I set my priorities. If I can, I try to stretch while doing homework or try to combine them in some sort of way.” For school work, Jung also asks teachers for extensions if needed.
Eleanor Kraatz, who attends Champaign Ballet Academy (CBA) and has been dancing for 13 years, has also found that setting priorities is important in order to stay organized. Kraatz does strictly classical ballet at CBA. She is also a Senior Company member with Champaign Urbana Ballet (CUB). The company performs 2 full ballets per year, which require many hours of rehearsals in addition to the classes with CBA. She spends a total of 20-plus hours at the studio each week.
Kraatz also teaches younger dancers, is in charge of her studio’s ballet summer camp for 2024 (Student of Production), and is part of the Cleaning Crew (who clean the studios on the weekends).
Kraatz says that “keeping school a priority over dance [and] making lists of reasonable expectations of what I can get done in one night and whether skipping dance will help me accomplish those things” has been important in her experience. The weeks with more school work are hard, and she sometimes has to sacrifice going to ballet in order to finish homework.
During the week of performances–tech week–the dancers have late nights of spacing and dress rehearsals at the theater in preparation for the performance. Kraatz says that “during normal weeks, it’s manageable because you get into a routine, but tech week [is] more difficult.”
Uni tries to support the dancers during some of these stressful weeks.
Ankita Bhargava, who attends the Champaign Park District’s Dance Arts Conservatory and has been dancing for 9 years, appreciates the Uni P.E. department giving dancers a study hall in place of PE during tech week as it allows them more time to catch up on homework.
She has also found that during the more stressful tech week, it is helpful to “bring your homework with you to tech week.” She says, “even if you don’t get a lot of it done, at least you’ve done a little bit.”
Bhargava’s studio has a performance every year for which they start rehearsing five months in advance. She does classical ballet and contemporary/modern dance and takes classes Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays. With the addition of rehearsals, this means spending around 8-9 hours every week at the studio.
Bhargava says that since her dance schedule isn’t as intense, balancing school work and dance is not as difficult. On her off days, however, she does other extracurriculars, like piano, and she also attends a U of I class.
The three seniors offered advice for the younger generations of dancers at Uni:
Jung’s advice: “Get things done ahead of time [and] don’t stress about homework while you’re dancing.”
Kraatz’s advice: “Planning ahead, thinking about when you’re going to be busier with one or the other, but also like sleeping because then both dance and school will be hard.”
Bhargava’s advice: “Save your homework for the days you don’t have dance.”
