Balletmummy18

I’ll dm you.xx

As others have said , you know your child best and in my dd year some thrived and loved WL and others did not ( including my dd.) I’ll just add on the toilet issue the memorable day when the toilet fell down on my dd friend in year 9! Luckily she caught it with super strength only ballet dancers seem to have 🤣. I believe  the toilets have been updated since …

4 hours ago, SissonneDoublee said:

For year 7 places, the physios assess for available range of turnout, rather than working range. A child at age 11 that is not working with flat turnout can still have the hip joints to allow it later. This is far more important for Year 7 places, and the ability to use their potential turnout is something they work to increase over years.

Yes that was indeed the case - she gained full turnout as she went up the school. She is not hyper mobile and nor did she have banana feet or sway backs when she gained her place … she did and does have extraordinary strength and very long Achilles’ tendons. 

My dd did not have 180 turnout when she got a place in yr 7 at WL. 

Yep there is wifi and they get a password etc to use it.. but it does depend  on where u r in school for strength( toilets always worked!!)  so would top up account to be on safe side .

Well it’s a long time ago since my dd was there but she also started at level 1 …& it was her first taste of anything associate.. it was a real shock on the first Saturday how along the ballet class was and she did do the rep class too..newer parents can tell you if it’s changed …. It was quite strict and old fashioned but The progress she made in a a year was astounding and she very quickly got used to the long day.It was totally the best prep for WL in terms class teacher attitude compared with other associate schemes ( including JAs)and 6 years on she really values her experience there- said one of best things she did- funny enough 3 of her WL year came from there.She also made some good friends there too!Hope your child enjoys it too. 

There’s no guarantee that an Aub Jensen contract will lead to full artist contract… in these hard times as graduate  if you have the choice between full artist and an apprentice - you def choose the artist contract … especially if the choice is between RB and BRB. 

16 hours ago, Rob S said:

 

The cameras used used looked far smaller than those usually used for public release material

Last year’s performance was filmed and then only parents were allowed access to it afterwards as it was a ‘Covid ‘year and only year 11 from WL appeared alongside the upper school . Perhaps the school wish to do the same this year ? 
 

Certainly at ENBS performance this year  was also filmed but only staff will be allowed to view. 

Sarah has been amazing for my dd throughout her journey at WL and now at ENBS and can only endorse her as a very, very  special teacher. Her exceptional teaching is matched by her wonderful sense of humour and her experience of the ballet world both at vocational level and in company - can’t sing praises too highly as she literally saved my dd sanity during her WL years . She also has marvellous sense of perspective about this industry - we consider ourselves very lucky to have found her ( through this forum many years ago!) 🤣

19 hours ago, valentina said:

Being assessed out, and all that means, both negatively and positively, is just one dimension. The stress and pressure are only just beginning for those staying on. Overseas students being taken in in yr 10, quickly becoming favourites due to their much advanced ability, do not necessarily make it to Upper School and even if they do, can find themselves falling out of favour and being shunned for the new student just beginning. Just because you are in Upper School does not mean ( whoever you are and wherever you came from) that you are free from a particularly nasty and underhand, verbal and emotional abuse which can leave you broken and in tatters. This can be sustained for a very long period of time and lead to students suffering mentally and physically. This shunning process is often done in the cruelest and subtlest of ways ( so there's little movement for complaint) and leaves perfectly able students (a fact backed by other professional teachers) feeling completely broken and that they should give up thinking of a career in Ballet. All this can happen in lower school too of course, but there's a general sense that once you reach Upper School, you've made it. Hope this dispels that myth.

This Definitely happened with my dd in yr 7 etc at WL -and yep very very glad she escaped by ‘ failing ‘ to get into upper school to a far more nurturing environment in ENBS where she loves again to dance and has a chance to heal the long term damage . It’s funny lots of people used to tell me that her experience would toughen her up for the ‘real world of ballet ‘- suffice to say I cannot wait until she leaves the ballet  world …. 

Judging the academics of school especially a ballet school is fraught with danger  purely because the context can change so much from year to year . In my dd case she went to WL for 5 years …the GSCE choice was limited and devoting several hours each day  to dance meant of course that the quantity of academic hours suffered . But at the time she had some amazing teachers who expected students to  the same amount of work as ‘ normal’ secondary school . She completed GSCE Further  Maths in the evening taught voluntarily  by the Maths teacher on prep duty 

Completing numerous weekly assessments /mocks last year due to Covid to prove her attainment for her GSCEs whilst rehearsing long hours for her end of year performance was very challenging . WL is a ballet school first and academic school second .and we knew that when she went there in Year 7.

Yet small classes and outstanding teaching at the time meant she left with the highest GCSE  grades in all her subjects. Btw She was a hard worker rather than an academic natural

Ironically she had a horrendous time artistically and yet ,when we look back at her 5 years there, her academic achievement is something we felt she would not have achieved in her old school .

But ( and it’s a big but) most of her academic  teachers have moved on so  just a year later I now have no idea of the standards there so would hesitate to judge academics now - even as a secondary school teacher . 

I would also add that the academic requirement at upper schools is still  quite rigorous… ( something that we barely thought about whilst dd was at lower school ) …a foundation degree / diploma in ballet with the associated academic work can be very challenging for a 16 year old straight from GCSEs… 

25 minutes ago, Kerfuffle said:

Well done to your DD for continuing and proving them wrong @Balletmummy18! What did they mean by little performance opportunities - were they going to bar her from the school show? To me it seems brutal to uproot these children based on their ideas on who can make it as a classical ballet dancer, some of which  must be subjective. It’s a shame that we don’t have a training model where all children can access  centres of excellence in classical ballet (I know there is one in the North but as far as I know the CAT scheme around here is contemporary). Being able to train with other serious and talented dance students as well as have the experience of going to school with other children I think is the best combination. It seems to be how the pre-pro schools work in USA, even SAB in New York. Instead we either have to choose boarding schools at 11 or try and get into associates which don’t really offer enough hours with RAD schools often filling in the gaps. The individual local training often only has one or two pupils at a high level so it’s a lonely experience for them. My DD is extremely lucky to be able to train with wonderful teachers outside this system and still have a great normal secondary school with non dancing friends. I know this is rare though.  Hats off to to all those brave vocational children who pick themselves up and manage to start all over again! 

Thankyou -the AD meant by 'no performance opportunities' that she was put at the back by the wings or not chosen  for some dances . It caused some problems as she would by chosen by the teacher or choreographer to perform a solo /be at the front and then would be removed when the AD watched.  I naively thought as a Year 7 parent , that if she was was disliked by the AD Or not the right fit for the image of the school , she would  simply be asked to leave at the end of year 9 . The trauma from her  experience, being 'the football 'in a staff politics during year 10 and 11 has had long term effect on her self esteem, confidence  and mental health -  I would not wish that on any child or family. 

As a parent of dd who was told at the and of yr 9 that the AD felt she had no future in classical ballet and would not go on to upper school at the end of year 11 but she was not being assessed out .( it transpired the rest of the assessment panel strongly disagreed with  this opinion) We were given 1 week to decide whether she wanted to stay on as she was told she would be given little / no performance opportunities- I just wanted to say that the assessing out process/ end of programme  is not as straightforward as it appears .There was no indication 3 years ago that it was a new start for a new phase in 10/11 and the AD was true to his word regarding lack of opportunities and upper school  . It was hugely traumatic for my dd at 13 to hear his opinion and confusing for her to be allowed to stay on after the assessment…she felt like a total failure  especially given the naturally competitive environment of the school. 

I hope this is a unique experience - no other person in her year had this meeting and I desperately hope that the new programme will be transparent and accountable to stop this from ever happening again. 

(incidentally she chose to stay and gained a place at another prestigious upper school at the end of year 11)

Ah brings back happy memories of watching it at Milton Keynes with Adam Maskell as Carabosse  etc with friends in the front row along with my 8 year old dd. We had no idea about the content as not really dance/ ballet fans then… just remember my friends quietly putting her hand over my daughters eyes at certain points 😬😂🤣… it certainly had an impact as 3 years later daughter went off to WL! She’s now in1 st year at ENBS ..and yes I have been given strict instructions to get tickets for Sadler Wells in December….😂

I found this topic quite interesting as my dd was told to start pointe at 9 - horrified , I changed dance schools for her … only to be approached by her associate teacher of a very well known respected programme ,demanding to know why she wasn’t on pointe yet! She went on pointe at just 10….
That was 6 years ago …( btw my dd wasn’t some kind of dancing prodigy just a typical associate) . 
 

1 hour ago, sunrise81 said:

And I know of it happening the other way...  offered a place at WL but not the summer intensive!

Yep that’s what happened to my dd🤣😂

56 minutes ago, Waverley said:

I’m assuming later in the day - the last group on Friday was at 3pm I believe. 
 

Who knows, I’m constantly surprised by RBS 😂 we went out for dinner to celebrate tonight as wanted to reinforce to DD that we didn’t care about the results either way. She says she’ll be fine if it’s a No so hopefully we just move on if that’s the end of it. Sure she’ll be a little sad but i’m hoping it’s short-lived. Life lessons and all that… 

This post made me smile as we did exactly that when my daughter made finals at WL.. took her for an expensive lovely meal In Richmond to celebrate her achievement getting that far before we moved to Scotland……&  yeah went back there 5 years later on her last day when she left WL😂🤣

My daughter is going so will ask here. Incidentally she had a problem downloading her ticket today from the agency email and both the box office at the Coliseum and the agency were fantastic at rectifying it very quickly despite me acting as the middle man ( she is at ENBS and had left it until the last minute!!) 

Found this topic interesting as brought back memories of my dd going on pointe. Her school wanted her on pointe at 9 years old … horrified I took her out of that school… only to be taken aside by her associate school the following year ( yr 6 )and asked why she wasn’t on pointe yet …her new local school also wanted her on pointe… I gave in .. so she was just 10 . ..& when she started WL the following year they had all already started pointe - this was 6 years ago…
 

When my dd was at WL ( left June 2021 ) academics were excellent and she left with the top grades in all her GSCES- indeed her ex- maths teacher is still tutoring privately for ALevel as she’s doing a diploma course. Pupils were set by ability in some classes which of course were small due to overall year numbers. However the turn over of staff was and remains very high so I can’t comment on current standards this year . 

You know your son best and trust your  own instinct and how he feels .  When my dd was extremely miserable , homesick and unhappy in yr 7( the extent of her bullying by a teacher hadn’t been revealed) we were given much conflicting advice re homesickness etc  In our case ,I Ignored my gut instinct about the school etc and she stayed (and indeed enjoyed year 8- )however it’s a decision  that we all bitterly regret now .

Can only whole heatedly agree with Jane’s comments. How do you also prepare a 13 year old for being the football in the most bizarre game of intense staff politics - artistic staff v AD?? We had times when I knew as a secondary senior teacher I could not have coped with some of the situations my daughter found herself in  regarding these internal politics.

However ,  that issue was particular to us  and no one else in her year had that experience either so I don’t want to imply it happens every year - but it was definitely something that no book on teaching resilience and confidence to young adults / children mentions!!

Interestingly ,her recent experience at ENBS has been the opposite of her lower school  - far more caring in every way - they have been amazing . However  ,brutalised , we cynically wait to see if that will be sustained throughout her time there. 

Walking out of ‘The Nutcracker’ at ROH to collect my daughter at the stage door during the interval many times.( They are never allowed to see the rest of it even if a ticket bought from front of house -neither are they allowed any recognition from audience at end of a performance !)

Well things hadn’t changed re bullying in the last 5 years in my dd last voc school. My dd underwent horrible bullying from one member of her year especially in the last 2 years of her time at voc school. She tried to ask for help but was also dismissed by house staff who were fond of that particular student. 

I think you need to get a feel from others’ experiences for the general atmosphere of a school. In our case, the general pressure and competitiveness amongst artistic staff brought out the worse in both house staff and pupils. It was not their fault but being in a toxic environment 24/7 inevitably means that a survival  instinct kicks in and traits like kindness and morals are forgotten.

That’s a very sensible approach as we certainly did no expect dd to gain a place. It’s important to remember that each child is very different .

With hindsight, despite the brilliant academic results for her- we made a huge mistake and very much regret her going there as she suffered a traumatic experience artistically. HOWEVER this was not true for everyone and some in her year( she has just left yr 11) absolutely thrived . It’s important to know the good and bad even with such a prestigious place as your child is far more important than a school.