Vershawn Sanders-Ward Named Recipient of a 2024 Walder Foundation Platform Award

Vershawn Sanders-Ward, Instructor of Dance at Loyola, is a 2024 recipient of a Walder Foundation Platform Award. This unrestricted award of $200,000 supports and recognize accomplished Chicagoland mid-career music, theatre, dance, and interdisciplinary performance artists who enrich the City's creative and civic landscape through a commitment to honing their craft and meaningful community engagement.

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Loyola’s Dance Minor is Cultivating Community Through Artistic Excellence

Loyola University Chicago’s College of Arts and Sciences offers 68 minors, but the Dance Minor stands out because of its unique holistic approach to arts education. The 18-credit hour curriculum combines applied technique courses with foundations courses that enrich students’ understanding of dance theories and provide contemporary context.

The Capstone as a Stepping Stone: Preparing Dance Majors for Life Post-Graduation

Each February, the Senior Solo Showcase exemplifies four years of hard work and seeks to embolden graduating dance majors in their final semester Sarah Cullen Fuller, Lecturer of Dance, serves as the Artistic Director of the showcase and a valuable mentor to the students.

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Deborah Goodman: Pedagogy that’s Inspiring (Com)passion for the Arts

Cura Personalis, or care for the whole person, is a hallmark of Loyola University Chicago’s Ignatian mission, and Deborah Goodman, Lecturer in Dance, generously demonstrates this core value through her teaching practice. Goodman’s undeniable passion for dance fosters an environment of curiosity and optimism where students thrive. Senior Dance and Exercise Science Double Major, Megan Clifford, explains how Goodman continuously roots for each student's success and improvement, providing “various modes of feedback to help each student succeed.”

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Loyola’s Dance Program is ‘Excavating Hope’ by Fostering Individual Voices and Communal Growth

"Crouched awkwardly, a group of dancers are dispersed over a hardwood floor. One stands above them — a beacon. The lone woman looks up, reaching longingly for a world unseen. Inspired, she begins to dance. One-by-one, others get up and join her, demonstrating community as a mechanism of hope." The Loyola Dance Program and fall mainstage concert "Excavating Hope' are featured in The Loyola Phoenix. Click to read the full article.

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“Atlas”: Mapping Connections Between the Chicagoland Dance Community

"Atlas” continues to unify Loyola dancers with the greater Chicago dance network in its most recent restaging in the 13th Annual Counterbalance on September 30th and October 1st, 2023

Loyola Students Restage Dance Concert Piece “Atlas” for Momenta Dance Company and Physically Integrated Dance

Atlas, the Greek Titan, bore the sky aloft. With the same strength and conviction of the god, Loyola dancers and faculty have cultivated a culture of support and uplift that has extended past the campus grounds and into the greater Chicago dance community. “Atlas,” a new work choreographed by Loyola Lecturer of Dance Sarah Cullen Fuller in collaboration with the original cast, premiered at the annual Mainstage Dance Concert, The Dream of Home, at the Newhart Family Theatre in November 2022. In attendance one evening was Sarah Najera, the Artistic Director of Momenta Dance Company, based in Oak Park, Illinois. Taken by the performance, Najera was inspired to bring “Atlas” into the repertoire at Momenta Dance Company in celebration of their 40th anniversary season.

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Loyola Dance Senior Molly Kaiser Presents “The Dreamer’s Ball” in Mainstage Dance Concert

The mainstage dance concert student choreography piece is a unique opportunity for Loyola dancers to create a fully realized work together. “I loved working with my peers who also happen to be my best friends,” reflects Molly. “I wanted to give them a piece where they would shine and feel a sense of pride to perform. They did the same for me, putting in so much hard work and supported my vision being brought to life.”

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Loyola Dance Students Perform with Mandala Dance Company in Rome, Italy

Following a year of online instruction, the John Felice Rome Center reopened its doors to study abroad programs for Fall 2021. Students in Loyola’s Dance Program were among those who jumped at the opportunity to extend their classroom and learning experience overseas. Dance faculty Dr. Amy Wilkinson has lead students in summer study abroad programs for several years, creating a long-standing relationship with the Mandala Dance Company in Ladispoli, Italy. This summer, Dr. Wilkinson and a group of Loyola dance students traveled to the John Felice Rome Center for an immersive learning experience.

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Loyola Dance Students Attend the American College Dance Association Conference (ACDA)

This spring, the Loyola Dance Program attended the American College Dance Association North-Central Conference at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Led by faculty members Dr. Amy Wilkinson and Sarah Cullen Fuller, dance students in DANC 398: Research in Dance performed in concerts and danced in workshop classes during a five-day weekend event. These conferences were held in person for the first time since 2019, and Loyola dancers were excited for the opportunity to dance with fellow college dance students from the Midwest.

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How College Dancers Can Marry Their Passion to Activism

The Loyola Dance Program and it's student-led Dance Honor Society are featured in a Dance Magazine article that surveys undergraduate programs that merge the arts and social justice.

“Why should I be dancing now? Shouldn’t I be doing something more ‘serious?’ ”

In the midst of a turbulent political­ climate, racial injustices and a global pandemic, a lot of dancers might find themselves asking the same questions. But rather than abandoning the arts, college dancers are discovering ways to marry their schoolwork with activism, using movement to respond to the world around them.

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Dance Fieldwork in Chicago

Dance fieldwork by three recent dance grads exemplifies how Chicago serves as an extended classroom.

Social Justice

Chicago Inclusive Dance Festival featured on NBC Chicago

The 2021 Chicago Inclusive Dance Festival, founded by Loyola Dance faculty Deborah Goodman, was recently featured on NBC Chicago. This year's online gathering offered three days of workshops and film screenings celebrating everyday movement.

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Spectral Heartbeats featured on See Chicago Dance

"Even though we are still in the throes of the COVID-19 global pandemic and witnessing the majority of dance virtually, the Loyola University dance program has found a way to showcase the things that brings us all together—the common denominator of humanity. Spectral Heartbeats is an apt title for a program which takes personal stories literally to heart creating a ghostlike vision of what we are missing during this pandemic: human connection.

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Art with Impact: Activism Through Dance

Sandra Kaufmann, Director of Dance, speaks about using dance as an aesthetic instrument of change at Loyola.

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