No fall Mainstream class for Chesapeake Squares

[bjarvis]

I got word through the grapevine that there wasn't enough bodies signed up to justify a Mainstream class for the Chesapeake Squares this fall. I know they needed at least five bodies but have no idea how many they did get.

This doesn't bode well for the future of the club or square dancing in general in the long term: clubs need a crop of new dancers joining on a regular basis to offset the long-time members who move away, move on to different activities, etc.. I believe CS will take another whack at a class during the winter months.

On the other hand, since my personal calendar was already pretty heavy this September and October, a small part of me is relieved to the load lightened a little. It's not that the handful of Saturday sessions were a much of a burden, but there's a lot of preparation and coordination work which adds up. Lemons, lemonade.

Comments

[sfbearhoney.livejournal.com]

That is not good for CS. FCD has been having difficulties recently, but after some creative efforts it looks like they will have a good Mainstream class this year. It seems to be getting harder and harder, FCD had to offer free movie tickets even.

[bjarvis.livejournal.com]

DCLS has an open house next Monday and the Mainstream class starting the Monday after that. At the moment, I don't think anyone has a good clue how many may turn out for either event but I'm cautiously optimistic. More news as it develops.

[billeyler.livejournal.com]

I didn't hear any more about the FCD class after Lee sent that one longish essay about it a few weeks ago.

[sfbearhoney.livejournal.com]

I may not know everything that was done. But there was an announcement put out on the MovieBears list and the FCD list announcing free movie passes. Any new person showing up the next week would receive a free movie pass. Also any FCD person who brought someone would also receive a free movie pass. Total cost came out to be about $138 for the passes. They had enough angels and new dancers that week for 4 squares (in a 3 square location). As of this week I think I heard something like 13 people have paid for the new class. So this and any other efforts that may have been going on worked out well.

[billeyler.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's great! I remember asking Gary Young if "the moviebears have been tapped to their full potential!"

[billeyler.livejournal.com]

Uh oh...I feel for you. Always scary, and the board always takes the initial expense of this into account more than the fact that NOT having classes causes even more long term issues down the road.

I'll bet they're all hot for new plus, advanced and C classes though!

[bjarvis.livejournal.com]

Most of the Chesapeake Squares MS dancers joined DC Lambda Squares for its recent Plus class so there's only a handful of MS dancers now in Chesapeake Squares. These newly minted Plus dancers will take a while to solidify their skills before moving up to Advanced so it will be a while before the next course.

What CS could really use is an intenstive A2 workshop for their current Advanced dancers; I believe this is already in the works.

[rticboy.livejournal.com]

The same is true for the Ottawa Date Squares this year. There aren't any new folks interested this year - first time since the club started.