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In September, an experiment known as the W&L Dance program took flight at Washington and Lee. Approaching the end of the year, the program is considered a success and may lead to the development of a dance major over the next few years.

When the school became co-ed over 20 years ago, female students got together to create a dance club. And since then, it had been a student-led organization. It offered tap, ballet, and jazz, and the club held two performances a year, but it was a limited outlet for advanced student dancers.

Until this year, Washington and Lee was the only top-25 liberal arts college without a school-sponsored dance program. There are also more than 250 colleges nationwide that offer dance as a major. Students and administrators decided it was time for a change.

"With the opening of the new Wilson Hall for Art and Music, the moment is right to celebrate and expand the performing and creative arts at W&L," said Dean of the College Hank Dobin." "It was time to develop a for-credit dance program, emphasizing modern dance but also providing opportunities in ballet, and to hire our first full-time faculty member in Dance."

Jenefer Davies was hired as Visiting Assistant Professor of Dance for a three-year period. Pedro Szalay was also brought on as a part-time visiting professor to teach the ballet courses.

“As soon as I first came here in the fall, I started creating classes--hopefully classes that students would be interested in and that would help towards furthering the goals of eventually having a major,” ” said Davies.

Davies said that decisions about a major or concentration will be made by the President, the Dean of the College, and the Provost, and that they will need

to gauge student interest over that span of time.

“It is a great starting base," she said. "Once we have the professors and the course load then we can move on and really go full-force into a dance major.”

Five courses were offered this year for academic credit: Contemporary Modern Dance, University Dance, Applied Ballet, Musical Theater Dance, and Dance Composition.

During spring term students will also take part in an aerial dance course. Students will use climbing apparatus to rappel off the side of Wilson Hall. They will dance parallel to the ground using the side of the building as a dance floor.

“It’s really fun and exciting,” said Davies. ”And it’s interesting too, because it’s a whole different way of choreographing because you don’t have gravity as an issue as much.”

Shih, who had been a part of the dance club in previous years, said she has enjoyed taking part in a University-sponsored dance program.

“This way, it really pulls together the great group of dancers at W&L who have been training their whole lives and allows us to take classes together from professionals and to further develop our skill at the collegiate level,” she said.

The new program has even allowed male students to get involved in dance for the first time. Juniors Drew McWay, Jordan Campbell, and Joey Converse took ballet with many advanced female dancers this winter term.

“I guess we’d like to say we broke the gender barrier here at W&L dance,” said Campbell. “I’d say at this point, barring flexibility issues, we’re probably at the top of the class,” he joked.

All three guys also took part in the first performance of the W&L Repertory Dance Company in March. Davies created the Company in September, and students began working immediately on the performance.

“The performance was really exciting because students choreographed in the performance and also performed in the performance, and they also worked with guest artists,” said Davies. “So it was a very educational, well-rounded program for them.”

Two pieces from the performance were taken to competition at the American College Dance Festival for the Mid-Atlantic region. The 26 participating colleges each brought two dances to be entered for adjudication.

“Veil of Ignorance,” a piece choreographed by Davies and performed by Shih and senior Marjie Zethraus, was chosen as one of the top ten outstanding pieces in the whole festival.