Building confident youngsters through dance

A lifelong passion for dance has allowed Craig Bullock and Nicki Wiggett to help youth across the country shine and build their self-esteem.

The pair co-founded the Dance School Sports League (DSSL) which recognises dance as a sports discipline in the South African school system – this in turn allows pupils to get involved in dance as an extra mural activity.

DSSL is endorsed by DanceSport SA, the World Dance Sport Federation and Sascoc to address the need for a formal, recognised platform. Through the DSSL students have the opportunity to obtain school colours, provincial colours and eventually be part of an official “Protea” dance team who will be able to compete at the Olympics and other international events.

Bullock, also the chairperson of the DSSL and owner of DanceWeb Studios in KwaZuluNatal and Gauteng, is a dance and music fanatic and five time Street Dance World champion choreographer and coach.

“The youth of this country inspire me to be the best at what I do. You will find me at DanceWeb every day, teaching, coaching, choreographing hip hop, new school and salsa. This DSSL is the next step in bringing dance to the people and I am loving being instrumental in making this happen,” said Bullock.

Wigget, also the national secretary, has a history as a ballet dancer and performed at the Artscape Theatre in various shows.

“Together with Craig Bullock we established the Dance Sport School League in 2015 to inspire the youth to put on their sneakers and dance for their school, province and country. Dance has been and continues to be one of the richest forms of self-expression and has taken on many forms. Bringing dance in as a sport allows children of all sizes, shapes and ethnicities to participate in a sport,” said Wiggett.

She said dance had the ability to be judged and regulated fully as would a sport such as hockey or soccer making it fully viable.

“It is a sport that encourages character building and attitude while still providing the physical activity and technical skill that is needed in a fully regulated sport. Aside from bringing people of different socio-economic backgrounds together, sports can assist in building a national identity,” said Wiggett.

She said with South Africa’s long history of segregation, the role of sport in the country was crucial.

“Sport has been shown to foster social integration as it builds relationships between groups of people through sport’s non-verbal means of communication, it is a means to engage in a collective experience as well as establishing direct physical contact which surpasses class divisions,” she said.

Currently the DSSL is set up in 14 KwaZulu-Natal schools, 10 Gauteng schools and five Western Cape schools with more than 1 400 pupils competing.

“I strongly believe that dance and more especially, street dance can unite kids no matter what age, gender or size – building self-esteem and creating a healthier society in more ways than one. Our ultimate goal is to be in all provinces in South Africa and to be accessible to all schools no matter their financial status. Craig and I are currently in negotiations with the UK, Netherlands and Beijing to come on board for 2018,” said Wiggett.

She said once a school signed up, workshops were run and external or internal The Dance Sport School League aims to inspire children of all shapes and sizes to take up dance. coaches and adjudicators were trained in how to teach dance and run fixtures through a curriculum.

“As other sports have a weekly game hosted by various schools – so do we. The aim is to have three schools compete each week – held at alternating schools. The fixture lasts about two hours and there are three adjudicators who decide on placements of dancers through a process of rounds – first, quarter, semi and final. Dancers also have their choreographed solos which they dance against other dancers in their age group, which start from U9 to an open category,” said Wiggett.

She explained next up were trials for the provincial teams for a tournament that would take place in Durban from June 29 to July 2.

“We aim to ensure that our dancers are chosen to represent their schools, their district, their province and their country – based on talent only – it is immaterial which school you attend or your financial status. The best dancers will get through,” she said.

For more details on how schools can join the DSSL, visit www.dssl.co.za or contact Nicki Wiggett on 082 856 7666 or e-mail nicki@dssl.co.za