For competition kids, pursuing a dance degree is a natural extension of the years of dedication they’ve put into their craft. But the transition from the fast-paced buzz of the competition and convention scene to the college classroom isn’t always seamless. As two former champions and a college dean share, once on campus, competitive dancers need to adapt their mindset, priorities, and approach to training—shifts that can result in unexpected and illuminating opportunities for growth.
Back to Basics
After capping off her competition career by winning Senior Female Best Dancer at The Dance Awards Nationals in 2024, Sierra Drayton was excited to start her freshman year at Purchase College, State University of New York. But the new environment presented some unanticipated challenges. “I want to be honest: It was pretty rough for me at first,” she says. Aside from the typical college adjustment of being away from home in a new place, Drayton also confronted new styles of moving. “Unlike kids coming from conservatory programs, I had never trained in modern technique before,” Drayton says. “It was overwhelming at times, not knowing the proper terms for anything, or how to initiate movement and rotation from the spine.” College ballet was also a switch-up. “The pace is much slower, with a big focus on the basics, which makes you analyze how all the technique was put into your body in the first place,” she says.
Isaiah Villegas, The Dance Awards’ 2023 Senior Male Best Dancer and an incoming sophomore at University of Southern California’s Glorya Kaufman School of Dance in Los Angeles describes a similar experience. “At my studio, I zoned out a bit when it came to technique classes—rehearsing for comps was the focus,” he explains. “Now I have ballet every morning at 9 am, and I have to lock in and really pay attention in order to get something out of it.” While Villegas found himself physically dancing less in college than in his comp days, class became more gratifying. “It made me fall in love with dance again, and I enjoyed seeing my technique progress as the year went on,” he says.
Process Over Product
Kiesha Lalama, interim dean of the School of Theatre, Film, and Animation at Point Park University in Pittsburgh, noticed that former comp kids were struggling during their first semester. To learn why, and to understand her incoming students better, she spent two years judging on the comp circuit. “I realized that the biggest challenge for this group going into college is the lack of instant gratification,” Lalama explains. “They’re used to rehearsing Monday through Thursday, the adrenaline rush onstage over the weekend, and coming home with a trophy by Sunday.” In contrast, most dance majors wait months before an end-of-semester or end-of-year performance.
“Comp kids possess unique qualities—storytelling, fearlessness, the ability to adapt—that are valuable assets in college,” Lalama says. “Once they shift their focus from product to process, and find their own self-motivation—that’s when everything starts to click.”
Changing Perspectives
In college, the rivalries that characterized competitive dance life tend to fade, which can help foster a sense of community. Going into USC, Villegas was happily surprised to recognize so many classmates from the competition circuit. “Some of that competitive energy lingers, because it’s what we did for so long,” he says. “But we’re all in this new environment because we want to keep growing, so we challenge each other in a healthy way.”
That said, the shift from always being onstage to spending the majority of time in front of a mirror in class can invite a new level of self-criticism in the studio. Comp stars, used to measuring their success based on awards and judges’ feedback, can sometimes take self-critiques to an extreme. “Competition is all about chasing that next win, but I remind my students that perfection is no longer the goal,” Lalama says. “It’s about what they learn as artists along the way.”
Rewards Worth Waiting For
“When you permit yourself time to discover, explore, and hone your craft in college, the lessons learned can be just as gratifying as winning,” says Lalama. Drayton experienced this when she had the chance to perform one of her prizewinning solos from The Dance Awards exactly one year later to hand off her title at this year’s event. “After all the hard work I put in freshman year mastering my movement quality, it felt like my soul was buzzing differently onstage, and I wasn’t dancing for anybody’s approval but my own,” she explains. “More than any plaque or title, understanding my own artistry and who I want to be as a professional dancer is the best reward.”
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