Backbone of Back up
Whether education is the backbone of a career or a back up plan, both Sunday Shannon-Jackson and Chris Houston believe in it. Sunday has a BFA in Dance from Juilliard and thinks college provided her with rich insights and a forgiving atmosphere in which to make mistakes. Chris, a Scottish native with a Higher National Diploma in Languages and Communication from Glasgow Central College of Commerce, believes he would've become a dancer anyway but education gave him a back up plan. In the end, both have done very well; both are dancers in Celine Dion's "A New Day..." at Caesars Palace Colloseum in Las Vegas and both are prepared for whatever the future brings.
Sunday said, "In my senior year in high school, I had that tingle to want to just go straight out there and conquer the world but something said to me, 'Go and audition for colleges...I found that when I went to school, it gave me a foundation to really look at movement and to look for what each choreographer wanted...Every class I took, every different form of modern style, the more detail I got in ballet class, it opened up my eyes as to how I wanted to work as a dancer." It provided the backbone, the solid structure on which to build.
"There's more time to be taken. You can go to a teacher. When you're working, it's just the work and you have to know the work. You don't have that opportunity to say, 'Can you give me a pointer?' You're not supposed to show your vulnerability."
Sunday had plenty of time to assess her strengths and weaknesses. "I think school made me stronger - physically and mentally...It gives you resilience. You're able to handle rejection very well...It gives you a foundation to work with...Don't ever let anything get in your way. Find another way." Rather than bow to arcane standards of dance perfection, set and pursue your own standards.
"Don't let anybody tell you because of your height or your size, or the way that you're built, that you cannot dance...If you know you're a dancer, don't let anybody ever tell you different. If you believe, and you never give up, you'll achieve it. I firmly believe it."
Chris's perspective is slightly different. He sees education as a back up plan and is skeptical of dance degrees. He said, "...I'm a little bit suspect about the degree course in dance. You know, when you go into a dance audition and you say, 'I have a B.A...'" He shrugged. In other words, the title won't impress anyone. "If you want to go on and do movement studies or musical theater history or dance appreciation and criticism, I think yes, that's critical...For kids that are coming out of high school, I would say maybe, 'Go to college. Make sure you have your back covered because in the end, if everything goes wrong, you have something to fall back on,' and that's what I'm grateful for when I'm out of work. I know that I don't have to wait tables or work at McDonald's. I can go to an employer and give them a decent résumé not only for dance but also for the business side with my experience in that sector."
"I was planning to...become a translator or an interpreter for businesses because the course that I had done was very business orientated for Europe, and studying international marketing and business studies, socio-economics in the EU. Just thinking about it now, all those books that I read and now I'm just kicking my legs and jumping around...Discovering how far your body can go, always pushing yourself to the limit, never, ever being happy with your technique, always wanting it to be more, rather than just, you know, sitting behind a desk and doing the same old job typing. You know, square eyes...I think to myself, 'God, I really, really, love what I do.' I think dance is one of the most envied professions in the world. I think everyone always says, 'My God, you're a dancer. What do you do?' And that's nice to say, 'Yeah, I am a dancer. I am. I work hard for it.'"
Chris and Sunday both work hard for it and in the end, perhaps their views on the role of education aren't that different. Chris thinks it should serve as a preparation for the future and Sunday maintains you'll pick up extra skills while preparing for the future. She said, "It will make you able to make a choice that you'll be comfortable with. You'll never look back on it and say, 'I went to school and I hated it.'" The two are in unison about one thing: whether it's called backbone or back up, education is essential. •