Notes from Veronica.
Some notes:
- we had a large PE class which was kind of a pain to deal with - we didn't have enough angels early on.
- we were schedule constrained due to MIT schedule, and week 5 (a hard week) landed on the week we didn't have PE
- we kicked one person out of the class, and told another they wouldn't graduate (and they didn't come back)
- class meetings tended to be long and didactic (exactly what I didn't want!); consider cutting back on them in future
- some content was too early, and wasn't absorbed well. We often want them to know all these things early, but some things have to wait.
- got feedback that they would rather have flourishes earlier (and flourishes certainly got pushed back a lot...)
- Class Meeting content that people liked most was flourishes and recovery/survival skills. Hack tips, time to ask questions, and singer structure were also liked.
Class meeting schedule
(Note: we did not have a review week due to scheduling). Note that at least once PE ended this was an MIT-student heavy and overall very good class.
- Week 1 - intro speeches (and intro handout)
- Week 2 - swing teach; mention let-go of handholds (it's square thru week!)
- Week 3 - handholds, giving weight; How to Succeed handout
- Week 4 - Recovery Skills part I (based on first part of handout)
- Week 5 - few people were there b/c no PE (MIT monday); recovery skills part II (and handout)
- Week 6 - RLG flourish (& I think we did a lot of practice since people had missed the week before?)
- Week 7 - mention class dance, PE had to do survey, handed out formation handout, talked about it a little
- Week 8 - Weave the Ring flourish, discussion of what is/isn't helpful to lost dancers
- Week 9 - singing call lecture from Guy
- Week 10 - grand square, dosado, promenade 1/2 flourishes, start the hack tip discussion
- Week 11 - rounds, hack tip prep
- Week 12 - scootback, square thru, hang-on-whenever-possible flourishes, hack tip prep
- Week 13 - Graduation; class meeting very short and used for rehearsing hack tip demo
Statistics
(copy of what was send to t-s-d)
According to survey results, at least some of you are interested in hearing more about the demographics of the class, so here's some statistics from the fall class.
Class size:
- 55 people attended at least one week of the fall class, including 38 MIT students.
- 48 people attended week 1 of class.
- As of Week 4, we had 38 people still in the class.
- As of Week 8, we had 22 people still in the class.
Graduates:
- We graduated 18 people.
- 12 of them were MIT students.
- 9 of them were PE students (6 walk-ins and 3 pre-registrants)
- 4 graduates had perfect attendance. Graduates on average missed 1-2 classes.
PE:
- 29 people pre-registered for PE, and 22 of them showed up on the first night.
- 40 people attended the first day of PE (same as the first day of class), including 3 club members.
- By week 4, we had 25 people left in the PE class.
- These 25 all completed the PE class and got PE credit. (To get PE credit, they had to attend 5 of the 6 weeks of PE (weeks 1-4, 6 and 7 of the class) or attend 4 of 6 and do two make-up PE classes.)
- Of the 25 who got PE credit, 3 were club members (1 of whom pre-registered). 22 were new dancers, 14 of whom pre-registered.
Ginda notes that next year we will be limited to 30 people in PE; however, not everyone who pre-registers shows up, and we're allowed to over-register by a couple, so we'll probably have room for about 10 walk-ins next year.
Number of squares:
Class:
- Week 1, we had 13-14 squares during class tips.
- Week 4, we had 9 squares during class tips.
- Week 8, we had 6 squares during class tips.
- After week 8, we averaged 5 squares for class tips.
Walkthrus:
- Week 2, we had 5 squares for walkthrus.
- Weeks 3-7 we averaged 3 squares for walkthrus.
- Weeks 8-13 we had 2 squares for walkthrus.
Club:
Except for week 1, when we had 6 squares during the club tips, we generally had 4 squares for the (middle) club tip.