I agree with a lot of the stuff that has already been said. This sounds like a pretty challenging situation, but, as others have said, also an opportunity to grow those many beginners into experienced members of your community.
A lot of the advice that’s been given is for callers, but, as an organizer, you can put that guidance into the information you send to callers ahead of time. If they need to stick to simple dances, tell them so. If they need to include a few complex dances, but later in the evening, tell them that too. At BIDA our guide encourages callers to program a mixer early in the evening, which I personally think goes a long way toward making beginners comfortable dancing with people other than the person they came with, which in turn enables more complex dances. Though with over 50% newcomers, the impact of that may be limited to start with. (Maybe 50% of our callers take this advice.) I’d also do what you can to encourage beginners to come back—Don’s suggestions on this front are good. Those beginners will become experienced dancers before long if you can get them to stick around. You could also hold special events as a way to draw out experienced dancers who are not excited at the moment about coming to a regular dance, but might make an effort for something more occasional. An couple hours of advanced dancing in the afternoon before an evening dance can satisfy the need for more complex dances and hopefully some of those experienced dancers will stick around for the evening dance as long as they’re out. If you can pair this with a much beloved band and caller, so much the better. Best of luck! Harris On Mon, Jul 17, 2023, at 3:34 PM, Joe Harrington via Organizers wrote: > Hi Sandy, > > I think a lot of dances are facing this or similar situations. There isn’t a > silver bullet but there a lots of things you can try. What will work will > depend on your community - and not on mine or anyone else’s on this list. Do > what works, try stuff, and let us know how it goes, the good and the bad. I’m > going to mix in some general community-building thoughts as well as address > your specific concern about bringing back your core, in part because many may > not be there to be brought back. > > First, two observations: > > Lots of people trimmed down their commitments in the pandemic and are > enjoying a bit more free time. Many of those are not coming back, and neither > are some elders who have slowed down, those who moved away, etc. So, don’t > equate success with bringing them all back. Build a new core of prior and > newer dancers. > > Also, a trend that definitely accelerated in the pandemic is a decrease in > personal commitment to activity groups, even among older folks but especially > among younger. What they are loyal to is their friend group or partner. More > people pick and choose what they’ll do this weekend on the spur of the moment > with their friends or partner. This is a real bummer both because you need a > bigger community to get a critical mass and because skill advances quickest > with frequent practice, which people don’t get if they only come occasionally. > > So, some general things to try: > > A good way to take advantage of the latter trend is to focus as much on > making the dance a fun social space where people come to be with friends they > only meet dancing, as on the dancing itself. > > Make the dancing itself the most fun it can be. With lots of beginners, > simple dances danced at tempo are more fun than complex dances taught forever > and then danced slowly, even for experienced dancers. Make sure your callers > know the kind of crowd they’ll get and that they should prepare simple but > fun dances. Keep a reasonable tempo, so it’s dancing and not just walking. > Several recent threads here listed simple-but-fun dances. > > Make it a party all the time and give it a theme some of the time. People > love costumes (optional, of course), and there may be folks who are into > cosplay, decorating, fancier snack foods, etc. who can help. Advertise any > themed event, of course! Get on people’s calendars. Be on all the socials, > not just your generation’s. Kids have not done email or Facebook for well > over a decade. > > Specific to your question of bringing back the core: > > Reach out to your former core dancers and ask them in a positive way what > would get them to come out and dance. You’ll get some information, which you > can consider, but you’ll also be sending the message that they’re missed and > you want them back. Personal contact is better than an email blast. If > there’s a very large number, you could consider holding a private event on a > different night as a one-off welcome-back event. > > Pony up for a high-end band and caller and use that event as a > bring-them-back occasion. Reach out to the former core and personally invite > them. > > Make the last 2-4 dances each evening a little more advanced. Make it clear > in the ads, at the start of the workshop, and early in the evening that the > last hour or so is more advanced and may not be accessible to first-timers. > You can say that the workshop offsets the advanced portion, if people ask. > Then, do some moderately more-complex stuff in that time. Don’t expect > festival-level dancing. For my dance, I might try a hey. If it works with > mildly more complex dances, you can notch it up a bit more the next dance, > and adjust from there. The key thing is to monitor the newbies to see if they > keep coming back and join the advanced dancing after a few weeks. If not, > dial back. > > Hold intermediate workshops before the newbie lesson. Advertise this as a > quick way to get good enough to enjoy dancing all night. > > Finally, the two elephants: covid and gender terms. These have been hashed to > death, so let’s not do that again. Just be in touch with your community’s > wishes, make your decisions, and be clear about them. Depending on the > community, you may lose some dancers and take heat for it no matter what you > do. Predictability is key, here, as is staying in touch with the community. > > —jh— > > > On Sun, Jul 16, 2023 at 9:21 PM Sandy Seiler via Organizers > <organizers@lists.sharedweight.net> wrote: >> I am in Lawrence Kansas. Since Covid we have consistently had a larger >> number of new dancers than experienced dancers at each dance. This evening >> we had a very well attended dance with approx 70 people. I would estimate >> that at least 60-70% were inexperienced dancers. We are also in the process >> of grooming new callers and had a callers workshop in March so we are trying >> to integrate those folks in and get them more experience. I've seen on >> other posts that a dance can easily absorb about 25% beginners, but we have >> that formula pretty much flipped. We dance monthly which is a hindrance. >> Experienced dancers are fatigued of not getting to do more complicated >> dances. This has been happening for a long time and we need to make some >> changes so that we have a larger percentage of experienced dancers. >> Suggestions? >> _______________________________________________ >> Organizers mailing list -- organizers@lists.sharedweight.net >> To unsubscribe send an email to organizers-le...@lists.sharedweight.net > _______________________________________________ > Organizers mailing list -- organizers@lists.sharedweight.net > To unsubscribe send an email to organizers-le...@lists.sharedweight.net >
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