Master Mentor
The late Glenn White of The Joffrey Ballet gave me an excellent piece of teaching advice: "Remember, you aren't there to be their friend."
Some teachers will have taken immediate offense there. Let me explain.
I had been waiting outside a studio with two students, waiting to teach an audition class for a position with a professionally-focused studio under Glenn. I was chatting with the dancers, getting to know them a bit before the studio was unlocked for us. My audition class for a teaching position had begun. During the class I had made a couple of buddy-buddy, palsy-walsy comments to the two who had been waiting with me. I did get the position, with some good words for my teaching approach and corrections, but Glenn closed by adding, "Remember, you aren't there to be their friend."
He was right. We are there to teach. Our goal is to teach dancers the technique that will enable them to become great artists.
Glenn's words came back to me some years later as I taught at a studio where the very naive young director believed she did have to be her dancers' friend. She felt she had to get her students to know her and like her so she could keep them. She ended up losing the studio.
The students knew of her life, the death of her baby daughter, affairs, dreams and she of theirs. Nothing was secret. She would often toss out class and talk to them pseudo-philosophically about her personal loves and losses. Their technique was weak, but their bond was rock-solid.
Instead of steady technique classes, instead of a base of training that helps create an artist and gives a school a solid reputation as a place for probable professionals, she had amassed a tiny cadre of in-studio baby-sitters and ersatz friends. The students outside this particular cult felt extremely isolated. More than a few parents resented this. Some of the in-clubs parents felt her hold over their daughters was bordering on cult-level.
"Remember, you aren't there to be their friend."
Glenn's statement does not preclude knowing your students and how to get the best from them. It does ask, though, that the teacher maintain a certain privacy and dignity so he/she is free to teach without emotional burdens. Teachers can and must respect students, but I've learned that a certain distance is a powerful took for helping to preserve that respect. That respect, in turn, translates to trust as students remember the reason they are in class, and not your most recent wild party night. Their focus and yours will be improved if both sides are able to do their respective jobs, whether it is teaching class or taking it.
When I began directing the magnet dance program in a high school, I came in strong. The students were there to learn the art of dance in its different forms. It did not matter whether or not I was divorced, seeing someone, or childless to give them a good workout and let them know what was required of dancers. I did not need to know if they had just broken up with their six-month boyfriend or if their parents were divorcing to help improve their balance in pirouettes.
Elbert Watson, formerly with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, taught a master class to these high school students and echoed Glenn's words in his way. "The audience doesn't care if you are sick, tired, or injured; they are there to see a show."
Teachers are there to teach. Dancers are there to dance, both under many circumstances. That focus can help mold students into a higher professional level. It can help them find a higher level of strength they did not know they had when life gets rough. It can help them rise above the petty parts of life and find a resource in dance without succumbing to martyrdom.
The late Barbara Copeland was friendly towards us at TCU, endearing herself to us by her gift of teaching with focus and respect toward us and the art of dance. We had no loss of respect for her. If I had gone into the high school trying to be each student's friend first, they would never have learned what they did. They would have lost time in technique, and also lost that trust and respect a teachers needs to take a student farther.
Yes, it helps with behavioral issues to know that a student's close relative has died. Acknowledge that, and move on. But keep some privacy and distance. Just as office politics and shenanigans can undermine the health of a corporation, so can too much personal sharing and togetherness unravel a company - in one case it helped bring down a school.
Teach with respect for your students, the love of your art, and maintain some dignity and distance for maximum results.
Judith Hatcher has a BFA in Ballet from Texas Christian University and an MA in Dance from UCLA. She is currently on staff at Tidewater Community College in Norfolk, VA, helping organize and build a dance department.