The Claremont Colleges Ballroom Dance Company

Cha Cha

Waltz

Dancing with the Claremont Stars returns for its third annual appearance at the Claremont Colleges. It's open to faculty, staff, and administrators at the Claremont Colleges, and will be part of the upcoming Claremont Dance festival. Dancing with the Claremont Stars is a program put on by the Claremont Colleges Ballroom Dance Company that teaches faculty, staff, and administrators at the Claremont Colleges to dance and then lets them compete in a grand showcase at the end. More information is available in the participant information booklet [Word document]. Interested in participating, or know someone who you think should be competing? Download the application form [Word document] and submit it by Friday, October 17th, 2008 to be considered. Anyone eligible can do it, and it's lots of fun!

The triumphant, grand promenade was only the beginning. The 2nd annual Dancing With the Claremont Stars was truly an event of excitement from the first to the last moment. In our outrageously popular take on Dancing with the Stars, the CCBDC gave Claremont faculty the chance to become Claremont’s Stars and perfect a Cha Cha or a Waltz with coaching from members of the CCBDC. After a month of training, each star competed with their coach in this championship battle to earn the title of Claremont’s Best. At least, that’s the initial idea—any participant in the program will tell you that the event itself is merely icing on the cake. This year was no exception. After demonstrations by company members, the Claremont Stars took to the floor, competing in rounds of spicy Cha Chas and dreamy Waltzes. With the ballroom packed to capacity with students, family, friends, colleagues and co-workers, it was easy for each Claremont Star to shine. And shine they did! The first round of dancing demonstrated a huge variety in personality and dance moves, leaving a difficult decision for the judges. After a brief pause for tabulating scores, finalists were announced and prepared themselves for another exhilarating round of dancing. An unprecedented volume of cheering and shouts of encouragement kept the finalist at peak performance through the round. The Stars gave it their all, and then the big decision was in the hands of the audience. Each member of the audience voted for the pair they thought should be crowned as the newest Claremont Stars, and after each audience member had their say, the votes were tallied. Everyone held their breath for the final announcements:

In third place— Prof. Bob Schaffer and Erin Kelly for Cha Cha and

Ms. Sherylle Tan and Rudy Resch for Waltz

In second place— Prof. Chris Towse and Kelly Hewitt for Cha Cha and

Prof. Rachel Levy and Trevor Ashley for Waltz

…and the winners of the title of 2007-2008 Claremont Stars Champions are:

Prof. Jennifer Ward-Batts and Chris Fiorello for Cha Cha and

Prof. Debra Mashek and Josh Leavitt for Waltz

Congratulations to our newest champions—they will no doubt enjoy the oversized trophy and bragging rights during their well-deserved year long reign. Yet, even as we celebrate our winners, it is clear that the true scores for all our competitors was a dead tie: 10s all around! The CCBDC looks forward to gathering community members, students and fabulous dancing once again for Dancing with the Claremont Stars 2008-2009. 

Sherylle J. Tan, Associate Director, Berger Institute for Work, Family, and Children, CMC
Why did you decide to do Dancing with the Claremont Stars? I love to dance and perform and don’t have the opportunity to do that anymore. When I was younger, I took dance classes, participated in choirs, and was heavily involved in theater doing plays and musicals. I have done a few children’s plays at a local community theater but haven’t had the chance to do any performing in the last few years. I saw the opportunity to learn something new; I have never danced a waltz and this type of dancing is different for me. I thought this was a chance to do something fun and learn from our wonderful Claremont College students! And sure enough, learning has been so much fun!

What you are looking forward to at the event? I am looking forward to dancing and having a good time. I am especially looking forward to seeing other faculty and staff dance. We have so much talent at the Claremont Colleges, aside from our talented students there are talented faculty and staff with talent we are not always aware of. I think this is a fun way to showcase what we do not often see from our faculty and staff!

Random Interesting facts: I have a 25 lb cat named Chase Monster. I recently was in a yoga DVD, which is due to come out in 2008. I recently rode a 26.1 mile bike tour.

Lydia Plasencia, Admission Assistant for Data and File Management, Pitzer
"I decided to sign up for DWTCS because I thought it would be a fun experience. I really enjoy watching the show Dancing With the Stars on T.V., so I thought it would be fun to learn a new dance and compete. I am really looking forward the competition to see how well I do. I'm also really looking forward to seeing if this may be the beginning of me dancing recreationally. A random fact about me...I really love reality T.V Shows and on commercials I enjoy scrapbooking and sewing."

Pardis Mahdavi, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Pomona
Pardis Mahdavi is an Anthropology Professor at Pomona. She danced west coast swing as an undergrad, but this is her first time doing cha cha. Not surprisingly, she took to cha cha incredibly quickly! Her coaches taught her all the steps from bronze social in just half an hour! It took her less than three minutes to pick up the Fan AND Hockey Stick. Needless to say, they’re both very impressed. Though they’ve only met for a few sessions so far, her coaches are confident that their star is going to be amazing! Prof. Mahdavi says that she is "doing DWTCS because I love to dance, and I want to take advantage of all the student talent we have in the Claremont Ballroom Group! I have always wanted to learn the Cha-Cha and I couldn't ask for a better coach!" Some random facts about here are that she is a medical anthropologist, loves to do yoga and pilates, and used to be a trapeze artist.

Jennifer Ward-Batts, Assistant Professor of Economics, CMC
Professor Jennifer Ward-Batts teaches Economics at CMC. Though she enjoys staying active with yoga, running, hiking, kickboxing, scuba diving, and spending time with her husky, her most recent activity has been dancing the Cha Cha. What made her decide to try something new? Jennifer says, "I’m doing it because I love music and dancing, but it’s hard as an assistant professor to have time to take lessons. Also, I think it’s important for student to respect professors, but also to realize that they’re human--we like to do a lot of things that students do, including dancing, listening to music that makes our hearts race, and interacting with other people." Originally from North Carolina, she went to grad school in Seattle and did a post-doctorate at the University of Michigan before moving to Claremont in 2001. When asked what she was looking forward to about the competition, she replied, "I can tell you what I’m NOT looking forward to. I’m not looking forward to this being over because I have really enjoyed getting together with Asumi and Chris every week to dance, and I’ll miss that."

Debra Mashek, Assistant Professor of Psychology, HMC
Professor Mashek teaches social psychology at Harvey Mudd College. This is her first time in the ballroom--not that you'd know it from the way she waltzes! Deb decided to apply for DWTCS after hearing about the amazing experience from two colleagues who were part of last year's event, and she's loved every minute of it! She says, "I'm excited to see all the Stars perform. It will be really neat to see how much we've all learned since our first meeting on October 26." Deb's wonderful personality and great sense of humor are always present during rehearsal--when learning her favorite waltz step, the "push-through," her coaches couldn't remember the step's name. Deb promptly named it "Fred," only to realize that "Hank" was a much better name for the step. You'll notice that there are quite a few "Hank"s in the final waltz routine. Her excitement and commitment to DWTCS has been truly remarkable--Deb is definitely a star among Claremont Stars.

Bob Schaffer, Visiting Professor of Engineering, HMC
When asked why he is participating in DWCS he replied: "I'm doing DWCS because I like dancing. I've never been able to get my Latin hips working. I figured that competing in the Cha Cha would give me a chance to change that. I'm looking forward to the thrill of competing, dancing for an audience, learning a routine and interacting with new people." When he’s not dancing Bob Schaffer has been preparing for his first half-marathon, which he will be running next weekend, and, in the past two years, has been skydiving, SCUBA diving, caving and canyoneering.

Prof. Schaffer also happens to have a move named after him, though it’s not a dance move (yet!). When explaining it he said:
"My friends call it "pulling a Bob" when you do something stupid and, even though nobody notices it, you make everyone aware of it. The original "pulling a Bob" moment happened when I was on the phone with a friend of mine and we were ending the conversation. He said "I'll talk to you later" and I said "you too" and then hung up. Of course, that didn't make any sense, I thought he was going to say "take care" or "have a good night". So, I called back to inform him that it didn't make any sense and that I clearly meant to say something else. He cracked up and forever calls similar situations "pulling a Bob." Apparently, I do things like this a lot. A few years ago, back when people still had landlines, I called my cell phone from my other phone to check my messages - then my cell phone rang, so I answered it and actually said hello THREE times before I realized that I had just called myself and that it was me on the other end. Of course nobody else was around and I would have gotten away with it... except since I have a move named after me, I'm kind of obligated to "pull a Bob" and share that story..."

Debra Wood, Dean of Students at Scripps College, was extremely excited to be asked to learn the cha cha for Dancing with the Claremont Stars. Her love of dance and the idea of private lessons with students drew her to the event. After performing last year in the waltz event she was interested to move into the fun and lively latin cha cha. She has really enjoyed working with several amazing students in CCBDC and though somewhat concerned is looking forward to the night of the event.