DD wants dance career but not sure she’s good enough!

[Notcool1984]

DD 10 has her heart set on dance as a career (like many girls at this age) but I feel worried she’s going to keep facing disappointment as (without sounding harsh!) she’s quite average....

She takes dance classes in ballet, tap, contemporary and acro. She does well in exams (high merit for ballet) but not top of the class / distinctions etc. Some of her friends have been picked for competition squads and she’s been disappointed to not get into associate schemes some of her friends do.

she’s talking about wanting to apply for a local dance high school that a lot of the older girls at her dance school go to.

no doubt she loves dance and it’s her passion, she practices all the time, but I’m guessing that’s just not going to be enough when it comes to associate schemes / school dance programmes / competition teams.

I don’t want to put her off but I want to set some realistic expectations without dampening her enthusiasm.

does anyone have this experience?

I think I just feel bad for her as she so desperately wants these opportunities that she keeps missing out on.

It is hard to see your children fail but failure is a really important part of life- arguably if you never fail you never succeed.

But I think it's really important to let them give it a go because then you know. If you never try, you always have that "what if" at the back of your mind.

Lots of girls love dance at that age. I know did, my sister and did all the classes after school and weekends. I lost all interest once I started secondary school. Different friends came along with new hobbies. My sister did it a few more years but eventually stopped.
I was extremely 'horsey' shared a horse rode a couple of times of a week. Thought it would be lifelong dream. I gave up at 17/18. Again different friends and circles.
Let her have her passion and encourage it. Then, if she's not good enough later down the line or decides to stop she won't be able to blame you and resent you for years.

Particularly since you say she struggled academically, I'd be encouraging other sports and hobbies. Let her continue the dancing, but give her other things to be good at. She might not be on the associates course but she has made the cricket team, not done well in the dance exam but got a distinction in the piano one....

Yeh true. Although she doesn’t seem to want to try any other sports sadly!

My daughter is a similar age and on competition teams but it took her 6 years to get to that point. Dancing did not come natural to my daughter at all. Looking at her and other girls her age I highly doubt my daughter could make a career from it where as some of the other absolutely could. You may also find that once she goes to secondary school she won't be as interested in dancing as much. This is something I worry about with my daughter as he has worked so hard and is finally at a point where she's able to compete and getting some recognition and I don't want her to throw that away.

Realistically even the best dancers rarely become professional dancers. Many might do things associated with dance though, I have a friend who was mediocre who now owns her own dance school for example. I'd encourage but maybe find some alternative clubs so she has another interest to fall back on.

What do her dance teachers say?
At 10 my DD's dance teacher kept telling me she was really talented, but all I could see was a little dumpling who loved MT.
Now she is at Italia Conti living her best life on the MT degree course.
I kept her in main stream school til she was 16, she continued to do dance, singing, acting and MT.
She only ever got merit in tap exams, never took a ballet exam never entered a competition in dance.
She did acting and MT exams too.
So if your DD loves MY keep up the dance, but broaden to acting and singing - the strongest MTs are good dancers, good singers, but also really stronger actors as acting through sing and dance is a huge part.
There were people as keen as DD at 10 who dropped out along the way, but performing arts gives you so many great skills for life that her time won't be wasted as she will be confident able to do presentations etc.

It is true. They got into top dance/MT schools at 16. At 10 you'd have said no chance. Very few make it as a career i agree, but the improvement can be immense, but you do have to be very dedicated.

Hard work and dedication are not the only factors though @RedHelenB

And getting in at 16 is no guarantee of a career. As I said, my sibling won a place at 16 but still didn't make it. Getting through at 16 doesn't mean you can make a career of it

Aged 10 my DD seriously thought she was going to be a big star in a sport she played once a week. She talked about it constantly and was totally convinced that when she was old enough she was just going to turn up to the best team in the USA and play with them

Aged 14 she discovered a talent, that I would never have guessed she'd have aged 10. She's about to study it at degree level. I'm glad I didn't piss on her dreams when she was 10. There are enough people out there to do that for her.

I'm another one whose DD trained full time as a dancer. She is a teacher now and she loves it and happily doesn't see it as "second best" which is just as well as performing work is so hard to come by. It was always very difficult but the combination of Covid and Brexit has made the world a very, very tough place for British dancers.
It is a brutal path. When they are young you spend all your time worrying if they will get into Associate schemes and Youth companies, then it's the huge competition for full time training places. And they get one and you breathe a sigh of relief. They've made it. But they haven't. It's just beginning. They need to keep that place and plenty don't. Constant assessments. The constant pressure to stay thin. Then they graduate and you breathe a sigh of relief. They've made it. But they haven't. That was the easy bit. Now to find a job. Only a tiny percentage of would be dancers actually have meaningful performing careers. It's a bit less bad if you also sing and act, but for pure dancers, especially classical dancers there are so few opportunities and so many talented people.
I don't think it is pointless to undertake serious dance training as there are many transferable skills, but be realistic. There are late bloomers it is true, but they are few and far between, and even the girls who seem to have it all probably won't "make it" as professionals. And whatever you do, don't let her believe the Disneyesque mantra of "You can be anything you want if you work hard enough". Because you can't. Not only does that message lead to severe disappointment for many but it also dents self esteem and leads to kids blaming themselves. I didn't make it. It must be because I didn't work hard enough or want it badly enough. That's very, very rarely the case, but a lot of "failed" dancers blame themselves because it is what so many well meaning but misguided people told them when they were growing up.

Non-performer from a family of ballet professionals here. At 10, she should just love doing it. What she's doing now sounds great. And if she wants to make a career of it - fantastic!

Really serious pre-professional training starts at around 12 years old in ballet, and a bit later in other forms. Before that - from 8 to 11, children are only starting to learn the basics of turn out and core strength.

At 11 or 12, she'll need to start taking ballet seriously - at least 3 90 minute classes a week (none of this 45 minutes plus a whole lot of acro/doing the splits rubbish), plus Associate schemes to get a change in teaching and to mix with other more serious & talented dance students. Personally, I knew by then that endless pliés & tendus bored me, whereas my sibling (and my mother before her) just loved loved loved it. I kept dancing but did other things as well - nw I love plies and tendus!

Most girls know by about 15 or 16 whether they've got what it takes for the serious study of ballet. Again, other dance forms can start a little later). By that point she and you will know how she's doing, partly by observation, partly by teacher advice, partly by comparison (although don't take the comparisons too seriously).

So some things I'd do now:

• make sure her ballet training is as good as you can find locally. Did her teacher dance or train professionally? I don't count just doing loads of RAD or ISTD exams and then being a "student teacher" at the local school. I mean, did her teacher go to RBS, ENBSchool, Northern, etc etc
• Is she encouraged to try out for local Associates schemes?
• Where do older students of your current school go with their dance?
• Talk to her teacher. At 10, your DD's body is not the body she'll have at 15 or 16, but is there a good basic anatomical facility? What's her turn out like? What are the proportions of leg to torso? And so on.

Of course, there is more to a dance career than ballet. There's commercial dance, there's dance therapy, there are a number of careers which draw on intense and systematic movement training.

I haven't read the full thread (will do so now , but you can find info at a forum called BalletCo, and there's a US based one called Ballet Pursuit. Loads & loads of excellent advice there.

My short advice: lots will change in the next 4 or 5 years but if you want to give your DD the best chance of following her dream ballet training available, and then add in other forms.

Decent ballet training will give her a skill for life. I've been doing class 2 to 3 times weekly for about 50 years. It keeps me sane & strong!

And by 10 you do know who is good enough

Not actually true. Both the pro dancers in my family (one a soloist in a ballet company) were "average" at 10. Never placed in competitions, not the "favourite" or "star" of the studio.

Also you don't know how a 10 year old's body will develop.

@Notcool1984 if your family can afford it (time. money, resources) then let your DD do what is needed to have a serious shot at it. At the very least, she'll have spent her teenage years in the company of dedicated young girls, in an environment where hard work & dedication are normal. And she'll learn about music, and art, and the traditions of great art.

Not a bad thing to do, even if it turns into "just a hobby." I spend a bit of time working with adults around movement etc, and the number of women who say to me "I always wanted to dance, but my parents wouldn't help me." Don't be that parent ...

she's talking about wanting to apply for a local dance high school that a lot the older girls at her dance school go to.

Bit confused by this @Notcool1984 - is this a full-time vocational dance school such as Tring, Hammond or YDA, or is it a local state or private school which has a lot of dance on the curriculum?

At 10 I had similar concerns for DD (more about her being upset by the reality of not achieving a dream) but fast forward to 14 and I can see that if professional dance is what she wants to do she actually would be able to do it. She doesn’t attend a competitive dance school however and I think that made a huge difference, there was no pressure to be the best.
Let her enjoy the dancing and she’ll know for herself when she’s older if it’s the right direction for her

DD is only ten, she could change her mind, just support her with her hobby for now. I know a mum who’s DD wanted a career in dance, she had weekly trips upto London for years, to take her DD to a dance school, for her then to decide she wanted to become a lawyer.

@massiveclamps second one x

In my experience many full time elite dance students seemed to drop out around the 16 year old mark. I think at this point they realise there is a whole world out there outside dance that they might be interested in. When you're dancing at the level, there is no time for anything else. Your life is almost entirely dance.

It's interesting you say that, because having had a dc who started full-time training at 16 after GCSE's, she and I know a large number of past vocational students. It is more likely that, rather than giving up, a number of ballet students leave training at 16 because they are assessed out of the school (RBS in particular), and their places taken by others coming in.

@Notcool1984 Ah, you're lucky to live locally then.

I had a similar issue in that DS at that age was convinced he was going to be a professional football player. I tried not to discourage him but emphasised the need to keep options open as football, and I'd imagine dancing is something you can only do at top level for a limited time. That way she can keep dancing, but have a plan B for later on, or if dancing doesn't work out.

Not in the school we were associated with. If you got in you had the potential to make it professionally, so it was rare to be excluded for that reason.

Somepne with potential at 11 may not fulfil that potential. A lot can happen to someone between the ages of 11 and 16 that could make a dance career unachievable, or it could also be that some schools have an ethos of auditioning worldwide and bringing in the best students from around the world and chucking out their own students to make room for them. Looking at you RBS.

All the full-time schools that I know of expect their own students to audition alongside all the other candidates for 16+ places. They have to compete against the best in the world. It's not easy.

This thread has become so off putting about a career in dance. It sounds intense!