Somewhere along the way you have had a profound experience with your body working in motion…one that has led you here.
At Columbia College Chicago’s Department of Dance you will work with a world-class faculty and experience our internationally renowned Dance Presenting Series. You will be a part of a rich and diverse student body, one of the largest in the country, with whom you will build networks, engage in collaboration, and share personal, artistic, and intellectual growth.
You will dig in to your body’s previous experience with movement. You will deepen your talent for motion in our state-of-the-art facilities and in the context of an enlightened liberal arts curriculum. You will cultivate your understanding of dance not only by doing it, but by reading about it, writing about it, making it, watching it, and researching it. You will learn how the dances you’ve grown up with are linked to a rich tapestry of human history, an interconnected and evolving cultural legacy that is physical, intellectual, political, aesthetic, and spiritual.
You will explore movement through a wide range and focus of embodied experiences. Your participation in physical practices will include foundational study in historically significant techniques like Ballet and West African dance, as well as developmental study in Contemporary Dance. This study will be augmented by work in, among others, disciplines such as Hip Hop, Jazz, Tap, and subtle, ancient practices like Yoga and Tai Chi. Physical practice will focus on developing your capacity as a strong and flexible dancer. This core physicality will be the wellspring from which you will learn to articulate a body of work that will become your foundation for the making of dance, the teaching of dance, the performance of dance, and in working as a dancer in diverse industries (Our alumni are employed professionally as everything from performers in companies, to teachers in elementary schools, to workshop facilitators in police interrogation techniques.).
You will continue to build upon your body’s experiences with movement. At Columbia College Chicago our dancers are preparing for a quickly evolving future by immersing themselves in a curriculum that allows for real exploration in other creative disciplines. The diverse fields of study in the visual, performing, media, and communication arts available at Columbia will enhance your talents and increase your global relevance as a dancer. You will discover how your skills and expertise as a dancer are connected to the world at large and how they bring something to every conversation that would be missing if you were not in the room. As a Columbia College Chicago educated dancer your expertise in the techniques, the history, the culture, the theory, the making, the teaching, and the sharing of movement will be a valuable and necessary resource for the shaping of your generation’s next steps.
Onye Ozuzu
Chairperson, Dance
Columbia College Chicago is the largest and most diverse private non-profit arts and media college in the nation with more than 120 academic programs and nearly 12,500 students. Because of our size, we offer an unparalleled array of courses with exceptional technological resources in the heart of one of America's greatest cities.
Located in downtown Chicago's vibrant South Loop neighborhood, Columbia is a non profit creative academic community that takes a practical approach to arts education. Our programs in the visual, performing, and media arts are firmly rooted in a rigorous liberal arts and sciences curriculum, which provides students with the essential context in which to practice their craft, develop their voice, and launch a sustainable career.
Columbia is an eclectic, urban community located in the city’s Education Corridor. Close by are several other colleges and universities, the Art Institute, Navy Pier, the Adler Planetarium, the Field Museum, the Chicago Symphony, the main branch of the Chicago Public Library, Lake Michigan, and the Goodman Theatre. Convenient public transportation allows Columbia’s faculty and students to use the entire city as a social, cultural, educational, and professional resource, effectively turning all of Chicago into our campus.
Just about every corner of Chicago speaks of our involvement in the community. Competitions, awards, and professional forums are sponsored by Columbia College Chicago. Current students, faculty, and alumni broadcast over the local television and radio airwaves, perform in our city venues, and publish writing available in our city bookstores. Every student at Columbia is a part of Chicago’s vibrant and inspiring urban life—as well as a critical player in the burgeoning growth of its world-class social and cultural scene.
Columbia College Chicago believes in the power of your creativity. Join our community of outstanding faculty and alumni by applying to become a fellow Columbia student today.
We pioneered the concept of developing a faculty of working professionals, believing that no one can teach better than those who have been there and done that and are still doing it. As a result, our programs stress the career outcomes of a higher education, and our staff of award-winning professionals produces alumni who, in turn, become award-winning professionals themselves.
Our dance graduates become active participants in society who blend strong skills in creative/critical thinking with written, oral, and visual communication. Many of our students go on to attend graduate school in North America and abroad, while others find employment in cultural institutions, the non profit sector, public policy work or corporate settings.
Notable alumni working in the field of dance follow below. Due to the interdisciplinary nature of this field, some names may be re-listed in other programs.
Hettie Barnhill
Actor, Choreographer/Dancer
Fela!
Margi Cole
Choreographer, Dancer, Founder: Panolpy Festival Winner
The Dance COLEctive
Nana Shineflug
Artistic Director, Dancer
The Chicago Moving Company
Scholarships can be an excellent way to help pay for college because scholarship award dollars do not need to be repaid. These awards are mainly intended to be used towards tuition and fee expenses and, on occasion, extend to cover living expenses associated with attending college.
Columbia College Chicago is very proud to offer a variety of scholarships for both undergraduate and graduate students. In 2012, nearly 45% of incoming students received scholarship support from the College. Awards averaged $5,000-$11,000 per student and were based on a variety of criteria including academic record, demonstrated financial need through a completed FAFSA, area of study, creative samples, and non-academic accomplishments.
To help guide you through the scholarship process, Columbia has created a Scholarship Finder which enables students to enter his/her profile to see which Columbia College scholarship he/she may qualify for in the upcoming year.
The Dance Center, a four-story art deco building, is located at the southern end of Columbia’s urban campus. It is a superb facility, with six dance studios; a state-of-the-art 272 seat theatre; a “smart” classroom which offers large-screen video viewing and internet access; a small, hands-on audio/media lab; a student lounge; and locker rooms with showers.
