Current Events and Announcements
Current Events and Announcements
Student Interviewed in Newspaper
First year student Julie Brannen was featured in a Florida newspaper, speaking about dance with Parkinson's disease patients and the role of dance/movement therapy. Way to go, Julie!
6th Alumni Concert a Success
This year's alumni dance concert was standing room only. Our generous alumni, and their friends and families, raised over $3,000. Congratulations to our alumni coordinators, Laura Allen, Kristy Combs, Kyla Gilmore, and Kris Larsen, and all of our fabulous participants!
Schweitzer Fellowship Workshop
Program Chair, Susan Imus, lead an experiential workshop for Schweitzer Fellows in early November to introduce dance/movement therapy.
Schweitzer Fellows Program Director Ray Wang wrote to us
Thank you for your marvelous dance/movement therapy and counseling presentation and experiential workshop for the Schweitzer Fellows. You gave an informative, engaging and inspiring overview of the therapeutic uses of movement, and from the smiles and wholehearted participation of the Fellows, I am convinced that the workshop you gave will be an experience they will long remember and appreciate. Although we sometimes have had “ice breakers” for Fellows over the years, I don’t think we’ve ever had one quite so successful at getting the Fellows to “lose themselves” and be in the present moment with each other. I am guessing that some of them will be motivated to further explore the potential benefits of dance movement therapy and other arts therapies for their clients (and possibly themselves) in the future.
For more information about The Albert Schweitzer Fellowship, please click here. More photos and video of the workshop are available here.
Congratulations, Susan!
Student-led Fall Concert
Students organized and performed in late November to raise money for MOVED, their student organization. Using a kickstarter page, they were able to raise enough money to cover the cost of the venue. Between this initial effort and concert ticket sales, they yeilded over $1200!
We're so proud of you!
Photo By Matt Dinerstein, insight pictures
Announcing our NEW Certification Program:
The Movement Pattern Analysis Consultant Certificate
Second Year Student Published
Heidi Landgraf has published an article in Dance Studio Life. Congratulations Heidi!
Melissa Sanchez Receives ADTA Poster Session Sponsorship
Each year, the Dance/Movement Therapy and Counseling Department at Columbia College Chicago sponsors a thesis student to present his or her thesis research at the annual American Dance Therapy Association Conference. Melissa Sanchez received this award during the department’s annual Research Celebration and will share her work in progress —Experiencing a Mindful Body: The Use of Guided Meditation in Dance/ Movement Therapy with the Addicted Person— at the conference’s Research and Thesis Project Poster Session on Friday, October 21, 2011 in Minneapolis, MN.
Sanchez has been working in a Chicago addictions treatment facility where she is studying clients' experiences during guided meditation. This transpersonal research study also examines how dance/movement therapists choose to guide participants through various methods of body-based meditation through their use of intuiting, feeling, sensing and thinking. Sanchez hypothesizes that guided meditation may be a helpful pre-cursor to dance/movement therapy groups within addiction treatment as a non-threatening technique to increase body awareness and increase individuals’ openness towards body-based treatment approaches.
Sanchez is looking forward to representing Columbia College Chicago in Minneapolis along with seven of her teachers, five alumni and two of her peers.
2011-2012 Schweitzer Fellowship Winners Announced
CONGRATULATIONS to Jessica Sittig (MA, 2012) for being awarded a Schweitzer Fellowship for her proposal to introduce dance and movement into the trauma-focused psychotherapy program for clients and caregivers at LaRabida Children’s Hospital – Chicago Child Trauma Center.
Movement Therapy for Parkinson's patients at Hubbard Street Dance
Department Chair Susan Imus and Adjunct Faculty member Kris Larsen are mentioned in this article from Time Out Chicago about the benefits and future research on movement therapy for patients diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.
First Year DMTC Students’ Idea Featured in Manifest
Graduate students from all departments joined forces to create a “mini-golf art course” for Columbia’s annual end-of-the-year Manifest celebration, which celebrates graduating students and showcases the college’s creative mission and spirit.
First year DMTC students Emily D’Annunzio and Courtney St. Clair answered the call for mini-golf “hole” ideas with their proposal to form a landscape, or “Bodyscape”:
…Participants will be encouraged to interact with the movers within “Bodyscape” to help create shapes and/or sounds of the landscape. Ultimately, we hope that participants will move in the space with the movers. By walking into the space they are walking into the piece, whether or not they are actively participating with the work. As for the movers within “Bodyscape,” we hope to include dance/movement therapy students, other Columbia graduate students, and people within the community.
Their proposal was accepted and can be experienced on May 13, 2011!
First year student chosen for Exchange Program: “Emerging Grassroots Leaders in Nicaragua, Belize and the US”
Heartland International chose MA student Amy VanBecelaere to participate in an exchange program focusing on domestic violence, human trafficking, and women's rights/empowerment. Not only is Amy one of ten American women selected to participate, but she is one of the youngest candidates this year! One of the main reasons she was selected was because she is studying dance/movement therapy.
In mid-April, she and other Americans will join participants from Belize and Nicaragua for a two week training session. During training, participants will develop community projects to implement in Belize and Nicaragua. Their plans will be actualized when participants reunite overseas in September.
Amy’s ideal project involves forming a creative arts therapy group to help survivors of human trafficking and/or domestic violence. She has a deep passion for these issues as well as for trauma-based care and trauma-informed services. In fact, Amy decided that she wanted to become a dance/movement therapist while she was working at a Domestic Violence Shelter in Adrian, MI. One day she hopes to integrate this and her Heartland experience to start her own service agency for survivors of body-based traumas.
For additional information on the program, visit http://www.heartlandinternational.org/Belize%20Nicaragua%20Summary.pdf
Andrea K. Brown, adjunct faculty, was honored with Catholic Charities’ Employee Recognition Award on December 18, 2010 for her exemplary service as a Clinical Counselor. The award is given to just three of the agency’s 2000+ employees per quarter. The catholic Charities press release states:
"Andrea’s knowledge, skills, and experience make her one of the most informed professionals in the Chicago community for treating child victims of trauma. She specializes in working with children with sexual behavioral problems and treats clients with dignity and respect, preventing future incidents of abuse. While engaged in extremely stressful and heart-wrenching work, Andrea consistently maintains a full caseload, represents the department on external workgroups, always provides support, consultation, and assistance to her coworkers, and volunteers for additional projects such as training her colleagues on new assessment tools and clinical techniques."
Read an excellent interview with one of our students, Megan Hall, on our website!
Student Annie Snow is a member of Dance>Detour, recently featured in an article in Columbia College Chicago's DEMO Magazine.
May 22 - 23, 2010, the department hosted a Motus Humanus Advanced Seminar titled "Rudolf Laban: New Facets of His Life and Work" with featured guest speakers Dr. Vera Maletic, Dr. Evelyn Dörr, Dr. Jeffrey Longstaff, and Dr. Carol-Lynne Moore.
Lisa Goldman, alumni of both our MA and GLCMA programs, now adjunct faculty and internship supervisor, was interviewed on the local news about the work being done at her site, the New Focus Program at the Anixter Center.
Dance/Movement Therapy & Counseling Graduate Program in Demo Magazine. Read the article...
