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Ballet Tech today announces Ballet Tech Across New York, a new initiative providing dance enrichment to elementary schools across New York City. The program is a timely realization of the mission that has driven Ballet Tech for over four decades—to give the city’s public school children access to beauty, integrity, and joy of dance—and of Artistic Director Dionne Figgins’ vision for how Ballet Tech can best serve children in this moment of rapid evolution in both education and the performing arts.
Founded in 1978 by Eliot Feld and led by Figgins since August 2021, Ballet Tech operates the NYC Public School for Dance with the NYC Department of Education, providing intensive ballet training augmented with modern dance, tap, jazz, theater dance, and choreographic repertory. Alumni have gone on to dance with acclaimed companies such as Alvin Ailey, Abraham.In.Motion, Ballet Hispanico, Charlotte Ballet, Dance Theatre of Harlem, Martha Graham, Limón Dance Company, New York City Ballet, Pacific Northwest Ballet, on Broadway, and in film and television.
But Ballet Tech isn’t just a training ground for dancers. In addition to preparing students for a wide range of careers in dance, including as designers, crew members, and administrators, Ballet Tech gives them the skills and self-confidence to succeed in any number of fields—not just dance.
Since the organization’s establishment, Ballet Tech has conducted annual auditions in hundreds of New York City public schools. The students with physical aptitude and enthusiasm for classical dance, and for the rigors of early training, are invited to Ballet Tech’s full-time school. Ballet Tech Across New York (BTANY) deepens and reimagines the organization’s engagement with students in schools, providing them with a fully-realized 40-to-50-minute dance class instead of a brief audition.
Dionne Figgins explains, “For forty-five years—beginning decades before the long-overdue prioritization of access and inclusion in the performing arts—Ballet Tech has made it our mission to expose public school students all over the city to dance education. We’re proud to have auditioned nearly 943,000 children over Ballet Tech’s existence to date, creating a pipeline of future dance professionals. Ballet Tech Across New York substantially expands our contribution to public elementary school students’ lives as well as to the field, giving children the experience of social and emotional learning, cultivating in them the mind-body connection, and demonstrating that people of all backgrounds and body types can enjoy—and excel at—movement. Even those who don’t choose to pursue further dance education can become lifelong devotees of this vital art form.”
Schools participating in BTANY choose between two class offerings: Dance for EveryBODY or BT Ballet Basics. These tuition-free programs, tailored for 2nd and 3rd graders, are intended for students of all abilities.
Dance for EveryBODY classes introduce some of the dance techniques taught at Ballet Tech—such as ballet, modern dance, or jazz dance—and how these techniques relate to contemporary dance trends. BT Ballet Basics classes introduce students to the basic tenets of ballet technique and how they relate to storytelling. Ballet Tech identifies students who demonstrate interest and promise in these classes and invites them to enroll in the organization’s Introduction to Ballet program.
