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When Your Dancer Wants to Stay For Year-Round
Welcome to the Summer Intensive season. Your kids have been in their program for a few weeks, and they’re starting to settle in. Surrounded by like-minded dancers who are driven and love ballet, your dancer is thriving. Summer programs are great training opportunities for dancers, but they also serve as an important way to recruit…
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When Your Dancer Gets Leveled Down At A Summer Intensive
Many of us have gotten that call. “I got put in a lower level and I don’t feel challenged.” What’s your first instinct? Call the school? Tell your dancer to go talk to the head of the program to negotiate a reevaluation? Or perhaps you secretly start to question your dancer’s ability? First, take a…
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choosing Which Ballet Summer Intensive to Attend
Congratulations! Your dancer got accepted to multiple summer intensives. Maybe they even got some scholarships. This is fantastic news! But now comes the tricky part: actually deciding where to go. This is usually a really personal decision. It’s tempting to just pick the most prestigious program or the one with the biggest scholarship. And look,…
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Tips For Nailing Your Summer Intensive Auditions
Updated: January 5, 2026 – Happy New Year everyone! The day has finally arrived! Summer intensive auditions! You’ve been waiting for this day (or days) since your dancer came home from last summer’s intensive. Or, maybe this is your first go ‘round with the audition season. Whether you’re a newbie or a seasoned ballet lobby…
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Why Choose a Company Experience for Summer Ballet Training?
You’ve probably been hearing a lot about a more specialized type of summer ballet intensive called a “Company Experience” or “Choreography Workshop.” Seriously? Another summer program? Actually, we think this new development in summer ballet training is pretty cool. Several ballet programs have implemented these over the years and they appear to be growing in popularity.…
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Finally—Real Reviews of Local Ballet Programs
Until now, if you wanted to get a sense of the ballet training available in your local area, your best bet was to ask around. Maybe post in a Facebook group. Maybe text a friend-of-a-friend. Hope that the reviews from ten years ago on Yelp are actually real? But real, detailed insight into what a…
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The Waiting Game
**This is a guest post from Elizabeth Sullivan, founder of The Dancer’s Coach** Now that audition season is coming to a close, several dancers, especially those waiting on offers, report feeling a little uninspired and unmotivated. They aren’t sure how to manage these feelings and still get themselves to daily classes and rehearsals. First, this…
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Helping Ballet Students with Tourette’s Syndrome Thrive: Practical Advice for Parents
**Our fourth in our series from guest blogger Chelsea Weidmann on neurodivergent kids in ballet. Be sure to check out her new book, Artistry Inside Ballet Technique** I am thrilled to be back writing for the Ballet Help Desk. When they asked me to consider writing a post on teaching students with Tourette’s Syndrome, my…
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Grad Pro: A New Path for Dancers
With audition season around the corner, we’re excited to introduce Grad Pro, a relatively new organization from England, founded by Julie Bowers, former dancer with The Royal Ballet. After first coming across the Grad Pro website, we reached out to Julie to invite her to come on our podcast. We were especially intrigued by the…
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Girls Of Color Are Allowed To Feel Beautiful Too
**We are so happy to introduce Jessica Klanderud, a Professor of African and African American History and a ballet parent to two kids! Jessica was kind enough to share her newly developed method for dyeing point shoes to match skin tone. For anyone dealing with trying to match colors on tights and shoes this is…