The Footprints Dance Project

Footprints Kidz Question & Answer:

Q: What is Footprints?

A: We're a local, community based, non-profit, non-competitive dance arts project in Calgary, Alberta - a place where youth, parents and dance professionals work together to share knowledge on how to maximize children's creativity, artistic self expression and learning through the dance arts.

Q: What programs do you provide?

A: We provide classes in creative Modern Dance, Ballet, Hip Hop, Breaking, Latin movement and Capoeira. We put on public dance shows several times each year so our students also get to know a lot about how to put on shows and about theatre technologies such as stage and set building, stage management, lighting and sound. We have an extensive lending library of rhythm and percussion instruments which we use in our classes that our member families can borrow.

Q: I've heard that Footprints is only for disadvantaged or handicapped students. Can anyone join Footprints?

A: Yes. Footprints is open to everyone six to eighteen. But, since starting Footprints nine years ago, we've developed expertise teaching dance to students with learning disabilities and other special conditions. Most of our Calgary in-school Footprints Artist-in-Residence programs are in special classrooms, however, our regular weekend programs are open all children and youth. At Footprints, the dance teachers, students and parents work together to help each other feel at home, to share community, stretch and build on strengths. We stand on each others' shoulders to reach high to achieve our best.

Q: How can I join Footprints?

A: The first step is to get a letter of support from your teacher, a social worker, a doctor, or someone else who knows you very well and who can tell us why they think that the Footprints dance experience would be good for you. You can find Our address is on this website under How To Apply. Send us a letter telling us a bit about yourself and why you'd like to try dancing with us. If you're under the age of seven, you can send us a drawing of you dancing.

Q: Can a Footprints Artist-In-Residence come to my school?

A: Yes. But, first your parents and teachers have to call our office to talk about the unique talents of the kidz in your school so that we can design a program that is just right for you and your classmates.

Q: Do Footprints'dance programs cost money?

A: Footprints classes are free, but, because we are a community based project, our students' parents have to become members of our non-profit group. Membership dues are set by the Footprints Board of Directors every year. This year's membership dues have been set at $50. Our students' parents also have to volunteer in our fundrasing activities, and they have to help us put on our public dance shows.

Q: What if my parents and I don't have $50 for the membership dues?

A: Our Membership Committee that can talk to your parents about it. The Membership Committee may decide to waive the membership dues, or they can help your family set up a Pesky Pennies For Penne jar.

Q: Pesky Pennies For Penne? What's that about?

A: Footprints will give you a big, clean, pickle jar. You then ask your friends, family and school classmates to collect all the pesky pennies they find laying around to help fill the penny jar. The pennies will help pay your membership. The great thing is that the dance student who collects the most pennies each year wins a penne birthday party for 25 people. Penne is a kind of pasta that has a hole in it. Kids love eating penne because they can blow air through the hole.

Q: What if my friends and I can't find enough pennies? Can we fill my jar with nickles, dime, quarters, loonies and toonies?

A: Of course. That's the best way to be sure to be the winner of a penne pasta birthday party for 25 of your friends and family.

Q: What do you do with the pennies after students bring them in?

A: Our friends at the Royal Bank of Canada Braeside Branch pick them up, roll them up, and deposit the amount in the Footprints bank account so we can pay our our expenses.

Q: Are there any other costs for Footprints programs?

A: Students in our ballet classes need to purchase ballet leotards, stockings and slippers. Hip hop students cannot use street shoes in our dance studios. They have to purchase a pair of new runners which they wear only in dance classes.

Q: What if my parents don't have the money to buy dance clothes or new runners?

A: Footprints students who work hard in the dance classes and who can't afford to buy dance clothes or new runners, can apply to our Membership Committee for a Footprints dance attire subsidy, and, they can set up another Pesky Pennies For Penne jar.

Q: If Footprints is non-profit, and if students do not pay for classes, you must need a big pile of penny collection jars to pay the dance teachers and the studio rent. Do you pay for everything with pickle jars full of pesky pennies?

A: No. A circle of Calgarians and some excellent community organizations donate money to help us help kids who love to dance. Some of our best friends buy the Footprints Kidz Fabulous, Fresh, Fragrant Evergreen Wreaths to hang on their doors when they decorate their houses every Christmas.

Q: I don't know how to make Fabulous, Fresh, Fragrant evergreen wreaths. Do the Footprints kids have to know how to make evergreen wreaths?

A: No. Santa has two very special expert wreath making elves named Loretta and Charlie Willis. They make the Footprints wreaths at their Kootenay Christmas tree farm in British Columbia. Then, Santa loads his sleigh with the wreaths and brings these to the Footprints Kidz in Calgary. The Footprints kidz and their parents decorate the wreaths with traditional red velvet weatherproof bows,they gift wrap the wreaths and deliver them to Footprints supporters all over Calgary during the first week of December every year.

Q: Gee. Delivering Christmas wreaths sounds like fun. Who are some of the people in the fabulous circle of Calgarians who support Footprints by buying Footprints Kidz Fabulous, Fresh, Fragrant Evergreen Wreaths every year.

A: Glenda Jones, Irma and Lita at Cash Casino, Francis Wright, Edna and Jack Kenney, Donn Lovett, Catherine Hooker, Glennis and Walt Buehning, Roz Cummings, Margery Alger, Lisa McGrath, Robert Andryka, Mary Trainor, Jennifer Pollock and lots of others.

Q: So, does the money your raise from the Pesky Pennies For Penne and the Footprints Kidz Fabulous, Fresh, Fragrant Evergreen Wreaths cover all the costs of your dance programs?

A: No way. We receive generous support from the Canadian Tire Family Foundation's Jump Start Program,the Alberta Foundation For The Arts and the Calgary Region Arts Foundation. We've also received financial help from the good folks at the Burns Memorial Fund, the Calgary Co-op, the Rotary Club Centennial . We hold a charitable casino every eighteen months and this year we received generous financial support from the Alberta Lotteries Board's Community Initiatives Program.

Our friends at Dancers' Studio West,the City of Calgary Wildflower Arts Centre, Killarney Aquatic Centre, Village Square Leisure Centre and the Hellenic Community of Calgary and District provide dance studio space either free or at at very low rent. And, it's not uncommon for Footprints parents who are not experiencing financial difficulties to pay the membership dues of Footprints families who can't afford it. The members of the Footprints Gala Gardening Guild organize several fundraising events each year and operate our online merchandise store. The also sew costumes for our public performances. We're grateful for all this support. We couldn't continue our programs without a ton of help from so many great people and organizations.

Q: What is the Footprints Gala Gardening Guild and who can become a member?

A: People with excellent references and letters of recommendation who want to help us help kidz. If you know anyone who wants to join the Guild, have them call our office at 403-238-1210 to get an application form. The Footprints Guild is a group of people who make Calgary a great place to live by helping Footprints in many, many ways. Members of the Guild help us to sew costumes and to put on our shows, they volunteer at the Footprints Kidz Summer Blast Festival every August, they help organize our potluck refreshment tables at our perfomances etc. Read More About it...

Q: How many students do you serve?

A: Since 1998, over 500 students have joined our programs.

Q: What are your students like.? Will I fit in?

A: We're proud to say that our students are hard working, intelligent, creative kidz who ask good questions and come up with great ideas. They come in all shapes and sizes, and love to perform in front of an audience. A lot of their families hail from many different parts Canada and the world. We've got students whose parents were born in far away places like Saskatchewan, Newfoundland, Central and South America, China, Europe and Africa. We also have many children whose families have lived in Calgary for generations. The main characteristic that we are looking for in our students is the ability to come up with new ideas and to invent their own, new unique dance moves.

Q: Sounds like your students know a lot about dancing. Do I have to know how to dance to join Footprints? I have never performed in public. I'm too shy.

A: No. We're not looking for students who already have formal training in dance. Footprints teachers will teach you the basics. We're looking for students who want to work hard and can think for themselves. We want students who can think up a lot of great dance moves. At Footprints, being able to think for yourself and coming up with good ideas is known as having a high creative quotient or CQ. Everyone is a little shy to perform in public at first. Our teachers and students help each other to build each other's confidence.

Q: What are the qualifications of your dance teachers?

A: All our of our senior instructors are either university graduates or university students. All have a lot of experience in dance and in preparing kidz to perform for friends, family and the general public.

Q: I don't know what Modern dance is. I think that I'd like to try ballet. Does Footprints offer private lessons in ballet?

A: Yes and No. Footprints is a Modern dance based project. Students entering our project have to begin their dance training in Modern Creative Movement classes in order to build their CQs. Footprints offers group ballet classes. Artistic Director Neah Kalcounis may ask students who show good behavior and hard work in Modern creative classes to join the group ballet classes. Neah trained in ballet for over twenty years and has certifications with both RAD and ISTD. Private ballet lessons may be arranged with her outside the structure of the Footprints Dance Project.

Q: What is Modern creative dance?

A: Modern dance provides immense enjoyment and an opportunity for students to discover their own artistic creativity and physicality. It helps students acquire balance and ease of movement, musical understanding and the ability to think about real life in our community. It makes linkages with social studies, the visual arts, language arts, math, science and, at advanced levels, Modern dancers learn to create and perform dance using multimedia.

Q: What if I don't want to do Modern dance? What if I just want to do Hip Hop or Break Dancing or Latin dancing?

A: All Footprints kidz are required to begin their training in artistic, creative Modern dance after which they may move into other dance forms that our teachers offer.

Q: What if I try dance and find out I don't like to dance. What if I'd rather take drawing classes or music lessons?

A: Sometimes, Footprints is able to provide bursaries to hard working, intelligent kidz who want to explore art forms other than dance. In special cases, Footprints may be able to pay your registration fees to take art classes offered at the City of Calgary Wildflower Arts Centre.

Q: Why can't you people spell Kids right?

A: Hey -- that's what we call a very good question!