Haley Edmondson, COM 250 Reporter

Josh Trammell, COM 303 Editor

MOUNT BERRY, Ga. – Since a support beam in the Roy Richards Memorial Gymnasium broke this summer, the dance department at Berry College has been forced to relocate to the Cage Center for the academic year.

The transition has been bumpy.

During a dance party for students participating in the Governor’s Honors Program (GHP), held at Berry during the summer, a support beam under the gym floor broke, likely due to excessive jumping by participants. This was said to be the “precipitating event” causing the break, according to Debbie Heida, vice president for student affairs and dean of students.

The dance party was not the first such event to take place in Richards, according to Heida; dances were common prior to renovations completed in 2013.

Because the damage was not necessarily caused solely by GHP, therefore, Berry’s insurance is covering the repair costs, she said. Just what those costs will be, however, are not yet known, according to Mark Hopkins, director of physical plant at Berry.

The repairs to the Richards Gym cannot begin until after the football season because there is nowhere else to put the football locker rooms, according to Heida.

There are temporary wooden columns between the support beams under the gym floor so that the structure is safe for the football team, Hopkins said. The main floor is locked; no one is allowed in the dance studio, gym or offices.

A premium on dance space

Due to the unavailability of Richards Gym, Berry dancers have temporarily relocated to the Cage Center for the academic year. While not ideal, Heida said, it is available, and the best of only limited alternatives. The result has been frustration, principally concerning securing enough space for dance classes and rehearsals.

“It’s tough reserving a space that’s supposed to be open for students,” said Gabriella Rivas, Berry College dance troupe company manager.

Interruptions during dance classes and rehearsals are a problem, said Berry student and assistant company manager, Amanda Tomlinson, and Berry alumnus and dance major Payton Campbell, who still is an active member of the dance department.

Faculty also have concerns, such as the type of floor dancers are now using and the lack of private space for student choreographers.

In June 2017, prior to the arrival of GHP, a specific type of vinyl dance flooring known as Marley was installed in the Richards dance studio, according to Hopkins.

“A dance facility needs Marley,” said Stacey Perkinson, adjunct instructor at Berry for ballet and jazz. “That is the most versatile dance floor on the planet, and we need that to dance barefoot, dance in ballet shoes, for jazz class.”

The multi-purpose rooms in the Cage are not designed to be used as dance studios, and they are not equipped with the Marley flooring, according to Perkinson.

Choreography taking a hit

Dance minors at Berry are required to take the choreography class, in which they learn how to create dances and conduct auditions and rehearsals of their pieces for the annual spring concert. Choreographers say they are having trouble finding times when the Cage’s multipurpose rooms are empty and available for their use.

Jeanne Schul, artistic director of the Berry College dance troupe and a lecturer in dance

Choreography is described as a composing process similar to that of writing music or lines for a play, though choreographers are not rehearsing something that is already composed, according to Jeanne Schul, artistic director of the Berry College dance troupe.

“As a way of explaining why we need a dedicated dance space, a piece of it is that the creative process just takes time,” Schul said.

When there is a dance studio dedicated to the department, choreographers have the opportunity to work on their pieces privately and without interruptions, and they “have time to craft themselves as dancers,” Perkinson said.

Although the dance department continues to adjust to rehearsal spaces and offices being in different buildings, the dance faculty and students have received support from many individuals and departments on campus, including the art department, in whose building their offices have been re-located, according to Perkinson and Schul.

There is a concern that for the time the dance department must use the Cage, the department might be identified more with athletics rather than the fine arts department, according to Perkinson, reinforcing the importance of a dance-specific space on campus.

“This isn’t a team,” Schul stated. “It’s academic. It’s one of the fine arts.”