Embracing dramatic similarities, glaring disjunctions, and formal innovations, this online course will be an immersive experience through the trajectory of dance in the United States from the 1700s to the present day. By the end of the course, you will have developed an organic view of dance in the United States—breaking traditional forms, stretching genres, confronting racist practices, provoking social and political change, driving cultural exchange and collision, treasuring indigenous wellsprings of inspiration and expression, and catapulting into the future. Subjects explored include, but are not limited to, an American take on ballet, the impact of Black women on jazz and tap, Native American dance, the female dancing body, and cultural appropriation in dance.

Book required: Milestones in Dance in the USA (1st edition) 2023. Edited by Elizabeth McPherson. NY, NY. Routledge.

How do OPDI Online Courses for dance teachers work?

Our “online” courses are guided by a professor and include a co-hort of students (other dance teachers) with whom you will collaborate. They also include graded assignments, feedback, final grades, and Professional Development Credits (PDCs). Our OPDI online courses require on average between 6 to 8 hours of work each week, but it all depends on your learning style. It could be less or could be more. You can also register as an Audit student and do as much or as little work as you want and will not receive a grade.

We utilize the Sakai online learning platform to deliver the course materials and instruction. Our courses are asynchronous, so there are no required meeting dates or times but we do have a Course Start and Course End date; however, our courses offer at least 2 optional live Q&A-Feedback zoom sessions during the course to enhance opportunities for connection with other students and the professor. Every week of the course there are assignments that you will need to complete with due dates listed in the course outline / syllabus.

Assignments can be done at any time during the week prior to the due date and may include reading, watching videos, posting answers to prompts on a discussion board, writing an essay, reading and responding to other students' posts on the discussion board, taking a cell phone video of yourself completing a particular movement, taking a quiz, or completing a final project. The professor provides written feedback and grades and you get to connect with other students (who are actually dance teachers) via our discussion board and the optional live Q&A feedback sessions.