Professor’s Piece Among Finalists at Regional Conference
CCM dance students and faculty scored high marks at a regional collegiate dance festival in March. Out of 400 participants and 25 schools represented at the 2010 Mid-Atlantic Region American College Dance Festival (ACDF) at Virginia Commonwealth University, only two community colleges were adjudicated, and CCM was one of them. Forty-five dances were judged, with 12 pieces chosen to be performed at the festival’s closing night gala. The finalists included “At the Bottom,” choreographed by CCM Adjunct Professor Lisa Peluso.
“It is an honor to have your work positively critiqued and then selected to be performed in the festival’s gala,” said CCM Adjunct Professor Colleen McArdle, whose 1996 piece “EGO” was selected for the Northeast ACDF Gala concert and then went on to be performed at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, for the National Festival. “It is a real honor for CCM to have its dance program critiqued along side colleges and universities with four-year programs and to receive such accolades. It speaks volumes about the professional training of our dance program students receive and the artistry of the faculty.”
The ACDF’s primary focus is to support and affirm the role of dance in higher education as well as to promote the talent and creativity represented by college and university dance departments. The organization provides a venue for students and faculty to engage in four days of performances, workshops, panels and master classes taught by professionals from around the region and country. The conference presents a unique opportunity for students and faculty to have dance works critiqued by a panel of nationally recognized dance professionals in an open and constructive forum, to perform outside their own academic setting, and be exposed to the diversity of the college dance world.