If you read this...please spread the word...

Here in Kansas City we have a very small dance community per capita. Worse...we have almost no juniors dancing at all! We do have a very large arts community though!

We are commited to growing dancesport in Kansas City through charitable outreach, exhibitions, and especially through junior programs. Our special area of concern is children/juniors ages 3-25, interesting them in the sport, instructing them in the International styles and American smooth, forming amateur partnerships and providing them with dance space, training, coaching and competitive opportunities.

I personally am working to put together a set of videos/pamphlets to help us (and any other group who wants a copy for the same prupose)to educate people about junior dancesport and dancesport in general. Many pros and amateurs will be getting letters from me soon Hitting them up to donate video and photos! These include videos to educate children and adults, not just about dancing itself but also about all the great benefits of this most unusual of athletic artforms. Some of this material will be used to apply for local and national grants to support junior programs, senior programs, diadvantaged youth scholarships, and other community outreach work.

If you have any video of a junior dancer, or photographs of juniors that you would be willing to release, I would be very grateful to have them! I am also looking for adult amateur videos and photos, especially of seniors. We are often asked to speak with seniors groups, but can't always take the time out to do so. A list of contributors will be included on the videos!

Although our studio may in fact get some business from the production of these videos...it is important that you understand that this project is meant primarily to encourage and promote dancesport nationwide. Anyone who wants a copy of my finished works will be welcome to them...as long as their stated purpose is to encourage dancesport. Our studio is an independent studio. We have been working diligently in Kansas City to form a coalition of independent teachers to ban together for the good of dancesport here. We teach our junior students at the lowest rates I have ever heard of...and I teach many junior groups annually for free. I promise that any material you send me will be used ethically and wholeheartedly for the good of dancesport...and not simply as an avenue to profit. I imagine that everyone in Dancesport would profit from a greater effort to expose the general public to the artform of partner dancing as it is today.

Please email me if you have any contributions, want more information, or want copies of any of this work when it is finished. Thank you very much in advance, Mallee Morris