Dear Dance Community
It is my great pleasure and privilege to be able to provide you with an update on the Foundation initiatives during unprecedented times. The last year has been turbulent and our resilience as a progressive Dance Association has been tested. We are excited to report that we have delivered and kept the dance fires burning. Sadly, we have lost many lives, including staunch advocates of dance over the past year due to Covid and other causes. We sadly remember these losses for life.
As we have all been affected by the pandemic in some way or other, we as the South African Dance Foundation have strived to live up to our vision of putting the dancer FIRST. We have presented many innovations in Dance, challenged ourselves and the norm we are accustomed to, in order to be able to provide an platform for not only our members, but for the dance community at large.
We look back at 2020 where we hosted our very first online, South African Open Dance Championships™ Online. Despite this being new territory and posing several challenges, we proudly delivered the Championship successfully with 5 countries participating. We hosted several Online Congresses, spear headed by our Development Officer, Mr. Clint Borez with support from the Dancesport Faculty, which saw the highest caliber of Facilitators offering their time and love for this sport and art including World Champions, Joanna Leunis (Latin) and Arunas Bizokas (Ballroom).
2021 also presented some curve balls with the Covid Alert levels influencing the profile of our events. The Foundation rose to the challenge and hosted WC Coastal Super Series and the WC Regional Championships safely for ALL dancers. The Technical Faculty guided the protocol of the events aligned to the Government Gazette. The 2021 Freedom Day International Congress saw presenters from UK, Netherlands, Italy/Denmark and South Africa.
With all the uncertainty we have been faced with in our recent situation, the Foundation has remained true to the Dance, putting the fraternity’s safety, needs and passion as top priorities. We are proud to report that we have been able to remain as the Official and Founder member of the World Dance Council (WDC) and the Official WDC Amateur League (WDC AL) member in South Africa. This allows South Africa to nominate the top Professionals to represent our country officially at WDC World Championships and benefit from the WDC membership. The WDC sponsored FREE Congresses throughout the pandemic to its member countries and South Africa extended this benefit to the members. Additionally, the South African Dance Foundations proudly owns the Trademark, South African Open Dance Championship™ (SAODC). This is a gigantic step in ensuring that we work towards ONE South African Dance Championships™ as a collective with all the other Associations.
As things continue to slowly “normalize” we hope to see many of you returning to the dance floor soon. We warmly invite you to register as a Member to enjoy in all our benefits. The 2022 Tariffs and Registration Forms are attached. Professionals ONLY register with Head Office. Amateurs register with their Region OR Head Office (if the Region does not have a local Bank Account) Please contact me on andre.cloete1@gmail.com for all membership queries.
Please continue to stay Safe and Healthy and take care of yourself!
Yours in Dance
Andre Cloete, Director of Membership ( andre.cloete1@gmail.com)
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