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 National
Dance Education Organization
By Rima
Faber, Ph.D.
Investing in the Future of Dance
Dance
acquired a new advocate when the National Dance Education
Organization came to life in 1998, with the mission to advance
arts-centered dance education. Until then, dance in
educational institutions was represented nationally as an
aspect of physical education, not as an art form. With the
founding of NDEO, dance professionals acknowledged their
obligation to teach the art of dance and to educate dance
artists in all venues of delivery.
NDEO found
immediate approval and membership among the leaders of dance
education nationwide, in private dance schools, K–12 programs,
higher education, arts organizations, and government agencies.
Its membership built quickly. The organization
focuses on
advancing dance from both top down and bottom up by promoting
policy for the inclusion of dance and creating services to
help the individual dance educator.
NDEO
believes that everyone has the right to enjoy the art of dance
as taught by a qualified dance educator in a standards-based,
graduated, and sequential curriculum. In order for dancers to
become creative and aware artists, dance educators need to
address the art form as well as train the body. Therefore,
full dance programs must include composition and choreography,
dance history, and theories of movement along with dance
technique.
The
organization’s goals are to advance dance education centered
in the arts, strengthen the national voice and vision for
dance and arts education in the United States, and develop
infrastructures to support state and national goals in these
areas. Its members hope that dance programs in studios,
schools, and institutions will work together to educate
themselves, each other, and society, thus moving the field of
dance forward.
To affect
policy, NDEO is active in many national organizations that
promote education or the arts in education. Located in the
metropolitan Washington, D.C., area, NDEO works with
government agencies, national associations, arts
organizations, and educational communities to promote dance as
an art and in arts education.
In a
culture in which most appropriations and administrative
decisions are dictated by men, in which many Americans
consider dance as sexual entertainment or a means to physical
fitness rather than an art form, and in which boys are not
encouraged to dance or taught to value dance, NDEO has a cliff
to scale in its efforts to affect national policy and
educational agendas.
To achieve
its goals, NDEO acts in many ways. The following paragraphs
offer brief descriptions of the services and programs of this
organization.
An
advocate for dance
NDEO
forges alliances with more than 150 federal and state agencies
and arts associations in support of dance arts education. In
Washington, D.C., and across the nation, it publicizes the
benefits of dance education and fights for its inclusion in
arts programming. For example:
• In a
study on SAT scores from 2001, 2002, and 2004, students who
studied dance scored an average of 36 points higher in verbal
skills and 15 points higher in math.
• Workers
who have studied the arts perform 30 percent better than those
who do not, according to a study by the Business Committee for
the Arts.
• Only 20
percent of schools polled by the National Assessment of
Education Progress in 1997 had dance programs, and only 7
percent of those programs were taught by a dance education
specialist.
Local
and national networks
As
a national dance organization, NDEO needs local networks in
order to generate widespread change. It therefore developed
state affiliates. State dance education associations team with
the national organization so that NDEO members gain automatic
membership in the state groups. This allows NDEO to bring
national initiatives to the local level and gives local
organizations the power of a national voice. It also provides
states with the networking capabilities necessary to
communicate easily and coordinate their efforts.
NDEO also
serves its members electronically. Announcements about news,
jobs, and events can be posted and distributed to members over
the organization’s listserv. Its Forum provides an online
discussion board that gives members the opportunity to address
a wide variety of topics and issues. Members who have
questions or problems can post them on the forum for feedback.
National
and regional conferences
NDEO holds
an annual, themed conference in a different part of the
country each year so that all aspects of dance
 and
all areas of the nation receive attention. The 2006
conference, to be held in Long Beach, CA, and offered in
partnership with the American Dance Therapy Association, has
as its theme “Focus on Dance Education: Celebrating the Whole
Person.”
National
conferences include more than 200 presentations, panels,
workshops, master classes, and concerts. Typically, more than
600 attendees from all dance constituencies come together for
an exchange of ideas and collaborations to learn about what is
being done across the country in a variety of dance education
venues. They share goals and objectives and learn how to work
together for the betterment of the field.
In
addition, state affiliate organizations hold regional
conferences, usually for one or two days, which bring local
talent together for workshops and networking.
Standards for dance arts
NDEO
provides curricular guidance through the development of
standards. Three sets of free, downloadable standards have
been posted on its website, www.ndeo.org: Standards for Dance
in Early Childhood, Standards for Learning and Teaching Dance
in the Arts: Ages 5–18, and Professional Teaching Standards
for Dance in Arts Education. Standards are a scaffold from
which to create a curriculum or syllabus. They are not
specific to a genre or style but provide age-appropriate,
open-ended avenues of learning that teachers can implement in
any dance program. They are intended to be informative and
inspirational guides for teaching.
Publications and resources
NDEO
publishes and distributes books, videos, DVDs, and CDs to help
dance educators become
more knowledgeable. Many NDEO members are leaders in dance
education, as well as authors, and so the organization focuses
on their work. A catalog and ordering information are
available in the publications section of the NDEO website. At
the annual conference, NDEO authors attend a book-signing
session at which members can meet them and discuss their work.
NDEO
provides members with its official quarterly publication, the
Journal of Dance Education. Most of the articles
provide information that is applicable to students in any
venue, but each issue contains at least one article that
focuses on private studios, schools, or academies of dance.
Periodically, special issues are devoted entirely to
information that relates to the private sector of dance
education.
Research
initiatives
NDEO
established a database for Research in Dance Education that is
publicly accessible through its website. This database is the
outgrowth of a 4-year project in which 50 field researchers
collected data about existing research in dance education in
the United States since 1926: where it is, who wrote it, and
to which issues, dance populations, and areas of service in
dance education it pertains. The database currently describes
3,000 documents but is continuously expanding as more research
is discovered. The patterns, trends, and gaps in the research
were analyzed and published in Research Priorities for
Dance Education: A Report to the Nation, which is
available through the publications catalog at
www.ndeo.org.
NDEO is
setting up a consortium of Centers for Research in Dance
Education across the nation. These centers are located at
institutions of higher education, and each will have a unique
focus. The two centers that have been established so far are
Temple University in Philadelphia, which will hold a series of
symposiums to define and develop the direction of future
research in dance education; and New York University, to help
develop wide use and expansion of the RDE database.
With
research now widely accessible through the database, NDEO
hopes that dancers will use it to gather information about
topics ranging from teaching, programming, and injury
prevention to management, advocacy, and policy. Although the
database does not provide access to actual documents, anyone
can obtain title and author citations and locations for the
documents, and NDEO members are offered a deeper level of
description and analysis. Copyright laws prohibit duplication,
but local libraries usually can access published works and
university libraries often can procure unpublished documents.
NDEO is
looking at dance education in the next millennium and planning
for the future. Its members hope to see studios filled with
happy students receiving excellent dance education and school-
or daycare-based dance programs for students who cannot afford
studio classes. They want schools to teach students to love
the art of dance so that they will desire intensive study in
private studios. They want to build future audiences who will
fill theaters and clamor for more. Simply put, the National
Dance Education Association dreams of a renaissance for the
art of dance.
Getting
Involved
In order
for NDEO’s ambitious plans for the future of dance to succeed,
everyone needs to get involved.
Here’s how
you can help:
1.
Provide
the local Chamber of Commerce with a list of dance studios in
your area so that tourist listings and hotels can include
dance events as local attractions.
2.
Present
school boards with information about the benefits of dance
education to promote in-school classes that will introduce
students to quality dance.
3.
Encourage school districts to give academic credit to students
who study dance in school and in private studios.
4.
Encourage museums and other cultural centers to promote dance
education as part of their cultural listings.
5.
Ask
librarians to include books about dance in their recommended
reading for children and adults.
6.
Get
together with other studios in your community to become a
powerful voice for the advancement of dance education.
7.
Join
NDEO and add your voice to the growing movement to bring
public awareness to dance education.
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