UAlbany Fails To Recognize Dance Team After Placing At Nationals
by Jackie Orchard
The UAlbany dance team fundraised and paid their own way to Nationals last year, scraping by with whatever they could. Wearing home-made, DIY costumes, the team of 15 girls won third place in the nation in 2019. They also received the highest score in UAlbany Dance history.
But the team says that even more than their lack of funds, the most challenging part of being a dancer at UAlbany is that the school doesn’t seem to care about the dance team’s accomplishments – even though they took third in the nation last year.
It was kind of a slap in the face." -Jenna Snide, Captain
Junior at UAlbany, Isabelle Ehrlich, is one of three captains on the dance team, and has been dancing for 18 years.
“One of our biggest accomplishments was when we placed third at our national competition last year in Daytona Beach,” Ehrlich says. “And I’d say that most people at our University do not know that.”
Including UAlbany Athletics.
There’s an event that all the teams under Athletics have to attend for the academic year. The girls were excited to be invited - Until they went to sign in.
“You have to look under your team for your name,” Ehrlich says. “And we’re like, ‘We don’t see the dance team.’”
Instead, the girls were instructed to hand-write their names on the bottom of the page.
All fifteen of them. While people waited.
“It was a little bit of an embarrassment,” Ehrlich says. “And a let down. Because we felt like we were included and invited this year and we’re on good terms and we get there and we’re like, ‘Oh we’re not on the list anymore.’”
SNUBBED AT THE EVENT
Credit: Jackie Orchard
Drenched in sweat, the dance team strikes a final pose after rehearsing for the homecoming halftime show for three hours straight.
NEVER ACKNOWLEDGED
Then, seated in the auditorium, they waited as each sports team was recognized for their performance last year, hoping they, too, would be recognized.
Senior Jenna Snide, another captain, remembers how excited she felt that her team was about to be congratulated.
“They’d kind of list all the achievements of the other teams that were a part of athletics,” Snide says. “And we were sitting there waiting like, ‘Oh my God are they going to say it,’ and they didn’t. So it was kind of a slap in the face.”
Ehrlich was disappointed and confused.
“Someone was calling out all the accomplishments of different teams, like who made it to NCAA or who won this championship, this, that, all these awards,” Ehrlich says. “And we didn’t hear anything about our team and we’re sitting here like, ‘We got third in the nation in D1 hip-hop against amazing schools and... Nobody said anything about us.’”
After a recent practice, still flushed from the workout, Snide reflects on that moment.
“That definitely hurt,” Snide says. “Nothing was said about us.”
Credit: UAlbany Dance Team
The dance team stands on Daytona Beach in their home-made costumes with their trophy just moments after taking third at Nationals.
We're not asking for much... We just want to know that they know we're here." -Jenna Snide, Captain
The dance team emphasized that they were happy to see the other teams get recognized. But they don’t think that UAlbany Athletics understands the gravity of what happened last year.
To place third at the National Dance Association competition in Daytona, UAlbany dance had to beat 15 other Division 1 teams.
Senior Molly O’Shea says the National Dance Competition is like the Super Bowl for dancers.
“In the dance world, it’s a big deal,” O’Shea says. “Everyone that knows about it watches it and it’s intense, everyone loves it and everyone is going crazy just like they would be watching a football game.”
Although they feel unsupported, the girls are afraid to speak up. They say they do not want to lose the few privileges they do have, like performing at the games.
“You don’t want to overstep because they’re the upper people,” Snide says. “They’re your superiors... You don’t want to step on any toes.”
It isn’t just the lack of recognition for placing at nationals. The dancers say they struggle to find practice spaces and to pay for uniforms.
NATIONALS IS A BIG DEAL
Final scores of the dance teams who competed at the 2019 national dance competition in Daytona for Division 1 Hip Hop
The team was told that the school paid for uniforms a few years ago, and it would not happen again any time soon. The problem is, the team is growing.
“Last year we only had eleven,” Snide says. “This year we have 15 which might not seem like a lot, that’s only four girls, but in terms of uniforms that is a lot.”
According to the UAlbany Athletics department, the dance team shares a budget of 10,000 per year with the cheer team.
NO MONEY, MORE PROBLEMS
Screen grab of e-mail sent to Albany Student Press concerning UAlbany dance team budget.
When asked how much of that money the girls have seen over the years:
“Not much of it,” Ehrlich says.
The exact breakdown of the budget is unclear, even to the dancers on the team. According to the team, only their warmups and backpacks were paid for, and still three girls did not have warmups this semester.
The game uniforms were purchased through the budget a few years ago, but there are not enough of them now.
“We needed to get a black skirt from a different school actually,” Snide says. “Because we didn’t have enough”
Their coach reached out to a local high school for the skirt.
O’Shea says that having the girls buy their own uniforms is just a Band Aid – one that keeps falling off.
“The girls who bought skirts,” O’Shea says, “Say they didn’t return or they graduated or whatever the case was … They took it with them.”
The privately owned uniforms keep leaving with the person who bought it. So the team continues to run out.
THE BUDGET
Even though they are the official UAlbany dance team, they are not guaranteed use of the only dance studio with a barre and mirrors.
“Our dance studio that we practice in three times a week, even before games, we have to share with school clubs and stuff,” O’Shea says. “So if people reserve the room, it could even be just strangers, if they want to reserve that room and the dance team doesn’t have it reserved we don’t get it."
The problem is, the dance team gets many last-minute requests to go to events and perform on behalf of the school. This doesn’t always leave them time to reserve the dance studio to rehearse.
Snide says they’ve practiced in hallways and racquetball courts.
If they can’t get the space inside, they go outside, onto the field.
“One night we were out there,” Ehrlich says. “And all of a sudden they shut the lights [off] on us and we were like, ‘Oh I guess we’re kicked out. 8 o’clock, right on the dot.’ We couldn’t even go one minute over.”
If you look up the UAlbany Dance Team online, you won’t find any press releases or articles written about their 2019 nationals placement.
“Because there’s this stigma that dancing is just this fairy ballerina thing,” Snide says.
Ehrlich agrees.
“I feel like [Athletics] looks down upon us,” Ehrlich says. “We’re still there putting in hard work. We’re under athletics. We practice a bunch of days per week. We’re at every sporting event and game that they ask us to be at, even the extra events where there’s no game being played. We still go to those.”
The team emphasized that they love going to games, supporting the teams, and performing for UAlbany fans. But for people who spend their whole year supporting others, they would appreciate some in return, just once per year when they compete.
“We’re not asking for much,” Snide says. “You know, we aren’t expecting to get everything that the football, basketball, track teams, all of that- We’re not asking for what they get. We just want to know that they know that we’re here.”
The UAlbany dance team will return to Nationals this spring, most likely in another home-made costume and on their own dime.
When asked if winning first place would gain the respect of UAlbany Athletics, all three captains said:
“No.”
“We made history last year,” O’Shea says. She shrugs her shoulders. “And nobody cared.”
If you want to learn more about the UAlbany dance team, you can find them on instagram @UAlbanyDanceTeam.
You cannot look them up on the UAlbany Athletics webpage; they are not listed.
They shut the lights [off] on us." -Isabelle Ehrlich
KICKED OUT OF REHEARSAL SPACE
Looking for Respect
Where Dance would be, if it were included.
