Dancing with an edge

In the School of Health, Physical Education and Recreation, Room 167, a heated basketball game is being played and the screech of sneakers on polished floors and yelling teammates is audible from the hall. \n Further down the hall, the ambient noise changes quite a bit. Looking in H169, you see girls donning heels instead of running shoes and boys practicing spins and back steps on the side of the court. It is a meeting of the IU Ballroom Dance Club.\nThis particular meeting is a callout for the new semester, where free lessons and open dancing are offered for the evening. The club officers identify themselves with maroon T-shirts and come proffering information packets and release forms. They reassure everyone the forms are only a formality and there is no imminent danger of the "damage to personal property, catastrophic injury or death" outlined in the form. There are only a few stepped-upon toes.\n There is a large crowd -- and not just of boyfriends being dragged along by their girlfriends (although there are a few of those). There are plenty of groups of friends, both girls and guys, and a lot of students and Bloomington residents alike who just came by themselves to see what was going on.\nMany of the students found out about the callout through their HPER E109 class -- Introduction to Ballroom Dance. Sophomore Robin Barker had been in class and came to the callout, boyfriend in tow, for a little extra floor time.\n"We've had a lot of fun with it (in class)," Barker said. "All the students seem to enjoy it, and it will be good to know later for events, you know, weddings and such."\nFreshman Morgan Dunbar came on her own and had some trepidation about the whole experience.\n"I signed up for the ballroom e-mail list on their Web site," Dunbar said. "I've been dancing since I was in second grade, and I've been doing folk dancing at IU more recently. I think this could be fun, but I'm not really sure what is going to happen tonight."\nDespite any concerns the dancers might have, after about a half-an-hour, the party is well underway. Andrew and Michelle Tate, guest instructors for the club, lead lessons for the night. \nThe dancers all stand, line dance style, with the girls facing one way and the guys the other. The Tates demonstrate the moves for the guys and then the girls, while marking time with the music. They start with the Cha-Cha, a basic Latin dance step. The name Cha-Cha comes from the move, which works in a step-step, cha-cha-cha pattern, where you step forward (or back, depending on whether you are the guy or the girl), bring the feet back together and then take several steps in place.\nIn a very short time, everyone is grooving to the music and some are even getting a little adventurous and adding variations of their own. \nBut this callout is just the tip of what the Ballroom Dance Club is involved in. Besides free dance nights, there are also organized classes for beginners through advanced students. Along with these recreational activities for Ballroom Dancing, there is a part of the \n sport with a more competitive edge. \nIn a competitive setting, ballroom dancing is referred to as DanceSport. The national organization for competitive ballroom is the U.S. Amateur Ballroom Dance Association, an organization that oversees the development of ballroom dancing as a competitive sport and sets the standard for which styles and types of dance make up each of the many competitive levels. \nMany of IU's club officers and members are competitive dancers themselves who travel around the area to meet with teams from other universities.\nCarrie Capone, president of the club, is a member of the competitive team. \n"I got started in ballroom eight years ago when my cousin got married," Capone said. "They played a lot of ballroom music, and I loved dancing already, so I made it my goal to learn."\nCapone danced at Ohio State University last February and placed second in the Argentinean Tango competition. \nFreshman Jasmin Quasniczka, the club treasurer, has also been competing for several years. \n"I took a course when I was 14 when I lived in Germany," Quasniczka said. "When I came here, I knew I wanted to keep dancing. I've taken private lessons and now I dance with Joe Ehlers, our staff advisor." \nEhlers has been dancing for four years and has been competitive for the last three.\n"It brings dance to a whole other level," Ehlers said. "It's very physically challenging, but you have to make it look effortless."\nQuasniczka described the competitions as being fairly similar to most other intercollegiate sports.\n"You go and pay a registration fee, then you sign up for which events and levels you want to compete in," Quasniczka said. "The couples for each event all go out on the floor and dance while the judges watch. You are eliminated by round, and at the end, you win gold, silver or bronze."\nThe sport has been deemed physically challenging enough to be considered for the Olympic Games. The International Dance Sport Federation was officially recognized by the Olympic committee in 1997 and participated as part of the closing ceremonies in 2000. \nThe competition on the collegiate level can lead to far bigger things in the world of DanceSport, as it did for instructors Michelle and Andrew Tate.\nThe Tates met and began dancing at University of Illinois in a club setting very similar to that of IU. They have been partners now for seven years.\n"That club was my first experience with ballroom," Andrew Tate said. "It's a really late start for serious competitors, but plenty of people get involved with college classes and then go from there."\nThis past August, they won the title of US National 10-Dance Champions at the 2003 USABDA National DanceSport Championships competition. A 10-dance champion needs to perform all 10 of the dances outlined in the International Standard and Latin categories of the USABDA official syllabus: Waltz, Tango, Foxtrot, Quickstep, Viennese Waltz, Cha-Cha, Rumba, Samba, Paso Doble and Jive. \nMichelle and Andrew base their teaching out of Indianapolis but come to Bloomington Tuesday nights for the IU Ballroom Dance Club where they teach classes for intermediate and advanced students. \nTheir teaching at this particular venue was met with fabulous results, as everyone seemed to have a great time, including those who were a little nervous to start.\n"It was a lot of fun and lot easier than I imagined," Dunbar said after the callout. "Mostly because a lot of other people didn't know what they were doing either. I am definitely coming back."\nWith two parts of the club, recreational and competitive, the main goal is for everyone to have a good time. \n"The best part of dancing is that you get out there where everybody loves what they are doing," Ehlers said. "That's what it's really all about"