Invitations or Inroads in the Pilates Field - A Ballet School May Have a Lesson For Us
Photo: Ballet Tech
It's a pivotal moment in Pilates.
Our field is reckoning with our identity, our roots and our future.
As with all aspects of social justice - we can not simply move forward without looking at our past. And we can not map or chart any new direction without examining what's been done before - and why.
Recently I took part in a groupthink conference call on the future of Pilates. Opening doors to more BIPOC in our community at every level is something our profession is eager to accomplish. The specific means however, seem to elude us. A suggestion of community classes was made and I felt initially excited by that. If everyone ran community classes to make Pilates available to students from all economic segments we could serve more people and develop future talent in our midst across all shades, abilities and economic realities.
That idea was quickly shot down by another participant who said "You can't just hope they'll come to you - you have to go to them". I've been replaying that sentence in my mind for several weeks.
We have to “go to them”. Indeed.
I've watched for over two decades as our industry simply copycats the business patterns of yesteryear. I've followed suit myself, without asking questions, just blindly following. I set up packages in my business just the way everyone else did until I learned better. I built our early teacher training according to a standard format until I examined closely and re-imagined.
This problem isn't going to be solved by following suit, or mimicking old patterns. Community classes certainly invite more people to the table. But is that our best option? Has anyone ever done something like what we are imagining?
Maybe.
In the late 1980's I was a young dancer in NYC. A friend referred me to the Ballet Tech school which was then part of Eliot Feld's Ballet company. I was hired to be part of their audition team. Eliot was building a school. A fully funded ballet school. As part of the audition team, my job was to wake up early, load into a mini-van with a team and travel to two or three public schools all over the five boroughs of New York. Some trips were pretty long and the days were always a full 8 hours.
We'd arrive at a school and typically set up in the gymnasium or an auditorium. Shortly after we arrived classrooms full of nervous grade schoolers would join us. We would ask each small child to run, leap or skip across the floor. They would show us their stretching. We'd ask them to show us how they pointed their feet. Occasionally we'd put music on and they'd improvise.
We looked for energy. Musicality. Spirit. An innate physicality. Eliot wanted movers. Not mannequins. Our mandate was clear.
If chosen, the child would be offered free ballet school tuition.
And free dance supplies.
And free transportation to and from ballet class.
We selected hundreds of children over the next few years. The school grew and the children grew up.
I haven't thought about those two years in decades. But after hearing my Pilates colleague say "...we have to go to them", I realized, we can't simply rewrite old scripts. Community classes sound lovely but if we really want to make a change, we will need an entirely new template.
Ballet Tech is now a public Ballet school and part of the NYC public school system. The ballet company it fed has long since shuttered but the lifetime of learning and an entire community of kids who might never have known Ballet is still going strong.
All because someone took the time and went to them.
I don't know what Eliot Feld's vision might look like for the Pilates community but I'm certain that it isn't about extending casual invitations.
It's about making authentic inroads and creating a new reality that works.
A reality that has the promise of longevity and one that we can be proud of.
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What are your best ideas for bringing Pilates to communities outside your own?
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