Here are my thoughts on the subject (they're fairly similar to Grace's) from my original post over on Ballet Alert (if anyone cares to read them
). I also sent this in the form of a letter to Ms. Kelly, and I await her response.<P>As a fifteen~year~old girl who spends a great deal of time at the ballet studio myself...<P>I'm thinking of writing a letter to Ms. Kelly. After I read that article, I was so mad I could hardly see straight. For one thing, having teenagers spend 20 hours a week at a ballet studio is hardly comparable to raping or beating the child. Besides, if her daughter didn't want to be a dancer, she'd<BR>quit. Obviously, the girl enjoys the lessons and wants to be there. Therefore, I really cannot see how the teacher is "abusing" the child simply by setting standards for ballet technique at her school. <P>Of course ballet dancers have to start very young and practice a great deal to make it. So do cellists, concert pianists, and opera singers. Are piano teachers to be considered "child abusers," too? It seems that if Ms. Kelly had her way, there would be very little in the way of the fine performing arts in<BR>the world (I say "fine performing arts" to distinguish opera and ballet from musical theatre, et cetera). <P>As for Ms. Kelly's statement that her daughter "is missing out on too many activities, too many friendships, and too much sleep," well, not only do I find the activities my school has to offer uninteresting (I do not enjoy chess, and running hurts my knees) but I have plenty of friends at ballet. I make many more friends each summer, many of whom I keep in contact, though they live far away. I could fill a house with the friends I have. Granted, some dancers are shy, and loners, but many of<BR>them like it that way and would be loners whether they danced or not. Ballet gives them a non~intimidating way to express themselves. And sleep!? My younger sister does absolutely no activities besides go to school and maybe a friend's house or a school dance in the evening, and she has so much homework that she is up until at least 11:30 each night, and usually later. And she's just 13. It's going to get worse. We go to a New York City public school. Now, my sister is extremely<BR>gifted academically, and is taking some challenging classes. But they all fit into her school schedule (nothing extracurricular) and her classmates all have the same problem. She's more in danger of burning out than I am, IMO. I am fortunate in that I only go to school in the mornings (8 am~12 pm) and dance the rest of the day. My ballet school is extremely rigourous in what it requires of students (besides ballet, we have classes in music~~piano lessons and singing~~choreography, history of dancing, theory, and dance notation~~Stepanov system) but I am often in bed before my sister. <P>Ms. Kelly suggests that parents of dancers make sure their children get enough rest and make good grades. That's fine. I sleep 8 hours a night and have a 4.0 GPA. That's much better than most so~called "normal" kids at my school. And some children just don't learn as quickly as others, and their grades wouldn't be good no matter what they did. If parents are worried about their children's<BR>grades, they should probably have their learning skills evaluated first, rather than automatically cut back their extracurricular activities (if they participate in any). Ms. Kelly also tells parents to "cancel any performances between September and June, even if she has to drop back a level. This decision will seem harsh to your daughter, but it's better for her to have a more balanced life now than to pursue a career she thinks she may want later, particularly since few high school ballet dancers are ever invited to join a professional company." I can say with certainty that if a dancer has to drop back a level in her dancing, there is absolutely no way she will ever be invited to join a professional dance company, whereas if she gives it 100%, there is at least a chance. I can understand how too many performances would not necessarily be good for a child. But I can't think of a single ballet studio that would drop a child a level back simply because their parents wouldn't let them perform more than twice a year. And frankly, most ballet dancers I know are extremely balanced people, much more so<BR>than other children, because ballet dancers have direction and discipline and focus. Other kids take drugs, go to clubs, drink, and/or become pregnant, but ballet dancers know what they want in life and they will not do a thing that could possibly get in the way of that vision. The ones who do don't make it. <P>"The training hasn't been a waste, however. She can go back to a more strenuous schedule when she finishes high school or go into modern dance, jazz, tap, musicals, or folk dancing later." <P>Please. By the end of high school, it will be far too late. If you don't join a company by age 18, you're pretty much out of the ballet world. And after one has done nothing but ballet, it is extremely difficult to train one's body to do jazz or modern dancing. Tap is even worse because the weight must be on<BR>the heels, and a ballet dancer's entire life consists of standing with her weight placed forward. And musicals? What if she can't sing? <P>"She will decide what to do when she's grown, but you decide what she can do right now."<P>All right. There are many, many dancers out there who have gone through ballet school with the possibility that they could become professional, and then decided that it was not for them and dropped out. They made the right decision for them, and I applaud that. But without giving ballet everything, they never even would have had the slightest chance of success. And most of them do<BR>not regret the years they spent as dancers, hoping to someday become professional. In fact, dancing is usually an extremely difficult thing to give up, even when it becomes clear that one is not going to make it. <P>And finally...<P>Why is it that when boys spend their lives on the football field or on the basketball court, they're considered normal, healthy people, but when a girl starts spending too much time at the ballet studio because she is progresssing well, it's "child abuse?" The chances that a boy will become a professional football or baseball player are just as slim as those that a girl will become a professional ballerina. <P>------------------<BR>~Intuviel~
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<P>BTW, there's a printer-friendly version in case you need to quote bits of her article in your post here - maybe we can send the columnist THIS THREAD, people, so get your pens out, and start expressing yourself!