USA Dance resignations

Bailamosdance said:
no, they have 3 dance events for instance in syllabus at these events. Same as USA Dance. Where did you think USA Dance got their models for competitions?
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If "they" is NDCA, sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. Pretty much never with a scholarship for syllabus. Sometimes a multidance "championship" for syllabus. Pretty much always requiring single dance entries (1 or more sets) to be allowed to enter the multidance. And then still, the multidance is uncontested, if anyone does it (am/am, senior, syllabus) at all. Woo-hoo, after paying high single dance entry fees to dance uncontested, there is the chance to enter an uncontested multidance!

It's an OK opportunity for floor time, if you don't mind the added expense, short heats, and sometimes being run over by pro-am couples that think you don't belong out there on "their" heats, anyway. (Good for learning floorcraft, bad for learning how to compete with/against your peers, since your peers are not there.)
 
we are talking apples and oranges, Am/Am does not have scholarship events or syllabus 'championship' events. These are pro-am, correct? We are am/am. And we are never put on the floor with pro-ams when we are am-am.
 
Bailamosdance said:
we are talking apples and oranges, Am/Am does not have scholarship events or syllabus 'championship' events. These are pro-am, correct? We are am/am. And we are never put on the floor with pro-ams when we are am-am.
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As a syllabus am/am, at NDCA, we are ALWAYS on the same floor with pro-am, unless for some reason they put us on the floor alone (one couple with the whole floor). Sometimes we have been combined with OPEN pro/am of a younger age group in our style, despite being a syllabus am/am couple. When the pros with open students are polite, it's fine. (If they are aggressive, we don't even have the patterns to get out of their way fast enough in some dances! Picture bronze or silver am/am couples out there with open smooth ladies A pro/am... or open quickstep, or open samba... not pretty.)

What multidances at NDCA are you talking about if not scholarships or championships? Those are generally the only way to get a multidance at an NDCA event for syllabus.

NDCA does sometimes have scholarship events for open level am/ams. These events are sometimes well contested, from what I have seen from the audience seats.

When was the last time you spectated at an NDCA event and saw a syllabus senior am/am event? What can you tell us about what you saw? Not what you think they offer, but what really happens???
 
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Yup. I've competed in am/am at two different NDCA competitions. The first, we entered pre-novice standard and latin even though we were bronze level couples. We did this because there were no syllabus multi-dance events available and we knew perfectly well that the pre-novice events would likely be uncontested. Which they were. We shared the floor with pro-am couples.

The second, we entered novice smooth despite our plans to enter silver and gold smooth at Derby City a few weeks later. We did this because there were no syllabus multi-dance events at this competition either and we knew perfectly well that the novice events would likely be uncontested. Which they were. Similarly, we shared the floor with pro-am couples at this competition as well.

(As an aside, we were actually quite glad we were on the floor with other couples. Particularly in the latter case, it was the first time I'd ever competed with that partner and it would have had a lot less value as the dry run I considered it to be had I not had traffic to navigate.)

The championship-level scholarship events were another story and were, in fact contested. And had championship-level couples, meaning we'd have had no business being on the floor with them.
 
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By the way, if there are NDCA events that are different than I am describing for am/am syllabus senior, please someone post the details.

I certainly haven't been to all 100+ NDCA events. But I have been on the floor as an am/am at more than a few, and also looked at quite a few entry forms, online results, etc over the years. I haven't really run into any major exceptions.
 
raindance said:
By the way, if there are NDCA events that are different than I am describing for am/am syllabus senior, please someone post the details.

I certainly haven't been to all 100+ NDCA events. But I have been on the floor as an am/am at more than a few, and also looked at quite a few entry forms, online results, etc over the years. I haven't really run into any major exceptions.
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I don't know of any either (I'm in California). Good posts. I can't seem to find any USA Dance events happening anywhere near LA either. Lots of NDCA comps where the entry to the ballroom is $80+ per person. I have to wonder if the downsizing of USA Dance means it is just that much easier now for organizers to raise prices. Seems that way to me.

USA Dance is relatively strong in LA/OC though on the social level.
 
USA Dance makes zero difference in the pricing of NDCA comps - and in the past, their animosity would have, if anything, driven costs UPWARD.
 
Larinda McRaven said:
Are ya'll talking "student/student"?
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I consider us to be am/am. We are am's in every sense of the word. Some NDCA forms say student/student. Some I think, mention am/am, depending on the categories and offerings. Either way, we're not competing pro/am, and we're not competing professionally (two pros).

We are two non-child (= senior in our case, older than college students) dance students out there competing together, in whatever category they allow us to. USA Dance, NDCA, and collegiate have various names for that. I call it all am/am, though that may not be the technically correct term in all venues. (I never hear am/am couples call themselves student/student couples, even if that's the term on the entry forms, so I don't use the term conversationally.)
 
And, despite my comments above, I am grateful that some NDCA comps will let us senior syllabus am/ams enter some heats. At least we get some floor time in a comp atmosphere in front of judges.
 
Digging through some entry forms, it looks like for the freestyles - some comps still call them "am/am", some "student/student". The "pre-novice" and "novice" multidance events I referred to previously though still definitely appear to be am/am though.

Anyways, the bigger question is if NDCA competitions, as a rule, offer good options for syllabus level am-am's. Replacing am-am events with student-student events would only make things worse. Certainly syllabus level am-am multidance events don't seem to be de rigeur.
 
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Bailamosdance said:
and folded all the NQEs except of course for the one that is run by the deposed president (the one who lost in a landslide)).
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"USA Dance" did not fold all the NQE's on the West Coast, as they are not run by the USA Dance National office, they were run by chapters and individuals who could not get the necessary entries to be able to afford to run these events any longer.

Also, bailamosdance, since you dance Champ/Open events, that is why you have never been on the floor with Pro/Am, but at most of the NDCA events that I have seen with am/am syllabus couples competing, they are always on the floor with Pro/Am couples...
 
Actually, all we need to do is simply increase syllabus participation at these comps, then there will be no room on the floor to combine heats.

As more syllabus couples participate, perhaps we can ask that combining heats be based on numbers. Even USA Dance comps combine heats...
 
Are there any NDCA comps with regular semis in syllabus events in Adult thru Sr X (well they wouldn't be Sr, they'd be Adult B or Over-35 or whatever)?
 
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