A number of years ago the Chinese government really got behind dancesport and decided to develop a system of schools to identify and train talented youngsters. I travelled to China last January and met some of the program's graduates who were in the "first wave" who were basically trained to teach at other schools and so to spread dancesport more fully. The school I visited was an unheated six-story walk-up in a city that had weather in the 30's during the day and the 20's at night. And still the kids came to dance. Dance and performance is a big part of Chinese culture -- it used to be that very young children were sent off to learn acrobatics and wu shu (the kind of performance martial art that Jet Li was a 5-time world champion in)...now dancesport is added to the list. It's all very interesting and is all very much like the old "Soviet System" where the government would identify and train talented poor children and their parents would basically give their children up to the government training centers and only see them once or twice a year.
The school I visited was actually a second-tier training center, where local kids would go and where their parents actually had to pay for their training. Anyway, everyone works really hard and there isn't any cultural/society crap given to men who want to learn how to dance unlike in the USA. The lessons are VERY VERY inexpensive, but when you figure in the cost of living difference and how much money the parents actually earn, it's still not a cheap endeavor.
The school I visited had about 300 students, ranging in age from very young (about age 6) up to older working adults who continued to take classes and practice as a hobby and for exercise. The people who run the school I visited were awesome, and really strive to treat the faculty, staff, and students like one big family. The facilities are poor: no heat, no elevator, very dirty floors, ancient sound systems, but there's just so much *heart* and such a sense of community there that it makes the whole thing work quite well.
A Chinese friend of mine who is now a US citizen used to compete with a Chinese dancer from this school. Through them I learned that the Chinese goverment makes anyone leaving China to compete at Blackpool pay the equivalent of a $10,000 bond to ensure that they will actually return to China. $10,000 is a MASSIVE amount of money, probably as much as some of these kids will see in their entire lives. I'm not sure where the money for the bonds come from, but I do find it interesting that the government is so afraid that people who leave to compete in foreign competitions won't come back that they make they pledge their life's savings just to be able to go. Now that's dedication.
I believe that the Chinese will be the next big powerhouse in dancesport for several reasons:
1) The cultural support for dancing and performance is already there.
2) For the millions and millions of people where who don't have a lot of money, becoming a dancing star is a way up and into the small but growing Chinese middle and upper classes.
3) The government has training centers, and with over a billion people to choose from, it's just statistically likely that they'll find and develop some excellent talents.
4) Working really hard at dancing is a lot better than working in the fields or in a coal mine, and doing well in competitions can bring honor and money to one's family, so the kids who do get positions in these schools stick with it rather than just quitting for whatever reason that American teenagers might have.
5) Competitive dancing gives women a place of equal importance with the man. In a country where people are only allowed to have one child and boys are still culturally considered to have more value than girls, dancesport is a sort of level playing field.
