We are excited to announce that the Department of Dance and the School of Music at BYU will co-host educational administrators from all over China for a two-week arts leadership workshop. The workshop, entitled Exploring our Differences: The Nature of Education and Leadership in the Arts, will begin Monday, September 24. The Beijing Dance Academy will arrive on campus on Saturday, September 29 to participate and perform in the second week of the workshop.
For the workshop, 19 music and dance administrators and educators from China will arrive to take part in an exchange with BYU music and dance faculty. Both teachers and students will participate in presenting the differences and similarities between Chinese and American approaches to curriculum, pedagogy, arts management, performance, and leadership in the arts.
BYU fine arts groups began establishing long-standing relationships with other art schools and groups across China in 1979. As a result of the rapport they’ve developed, BYU performing groups have toured China 26 times in the last 33 years. The 27th tour is scheduled for May 2013. Bringing Chinese officials to BYU’s campus will in return help Chinese participants further understand the mission of BYU.
Jiamin Huang, an associate professor of dance at BYU and one of the developers of the workshop explains, “We’re so different. We have different cultures, different histories, different beliefs . . . but we have a lot to share.”
The workshop will also feature two performances by the Beijing Dance Academy (BDA) with the BYU Philharmonic. The BDA is China’s only institute of higher education that offers a doctorate in professional dance. Established in 1954, and elevated to University status in 1978, the Beijing Dance Academy is sure to impress BYU audiences with its exquisite technique and talent.
Click here for more information on the performances.