I have been fortunate enough to attend UDA camps for the past three summers with my dance team and they have always been one of the highlights of every season. There is a lot of memories made and hard work done over the course of those four days that most of the time, others don’t get to see. So hopefully through this post, you get a glimpse into my experiences and takeaways from dance camp.
This was truly the real “first of the lasts” for me as a senior because the camp occurs before the school year officially gets started. But even before we could actually walk into the walls of the camp there was a lot of preparation that had to happen first. I, along with the other co-captains were faced with the task of choreographing a “home routine” to bring into camp to compete with. Thankfully our coach has us create all the routines for the team so it was more about getting back into the swing of working together to create an appealing number.
After around a month of conditioning and drilling our home routine we were almost ready to head off to camp, but not before our annual pool party and poster decorating session! This is one of my favorite memories because it gave us a chance to spend time together not just as teammates, but as friends. The different atmosphere and just being able to have fun was a nice change of pace before the craziness of camp actually begun.
Now if you have never experienced a UDA camp before, the break down is pretty simple. Over the course of four days you learn three routines, one as a team and two individually which are varied by style and skill level. On top of this, you can compete your home routine against the other schools there. It is a jam-packed few days but I always gained so much knowledge and a refueled passion for dance at the end of it all.
This year my coach had put me in Hip-Hop 5 and Pom 5 routines (5 being the most difficult level of routines they offer) so needless to say I was a little nervous. But both of the dances were high energy and super fun so picking up the choreography was pretty easy. It also helped having a few of my teammates by my side because it pushed me to work even harder. Our team routine was a Pom dance as well and since that is what we worked on all summer before camp, it ran smoothly and all the girls caught on extremely well.
On the fourth day of camp the staff holds evaluations for the routines we have been working on over the prior days and it is open for friends and family to come see all the things we have learned. Based on how well we execute our routine, you are given a white, red, or blue ribbon (blue being the highest and white being the lowest) and I was hoping to keep my streak of blue ribbons alive. And not only did I accomplish that, my whole entire team got blue ribbons for all their routines as well! Not to mention we also got first place with our home routine! I could not have been prouder of the outcome.
But at the end of the day the most important thing wasn’t the ribbons or trophies given out, it was the memories I got to make and getting to watch all of us grow not only as dancers but as a team. The late night practices, the silly team bonding exercises and the positive encouragement we had together is what will stick with me for years to come. I could not have asked for a better last camp, and I cannot wait to see what the rest of this season has in store.