The international debate of “is dance a sport?” finds a home in Goffstown, New Hampshire. In Goffstown High School, students have the option to take a dance course, either as a full year or half year. Along with this, many students dance at studios in the surrounding areas of Goffstown. Part of the curriculum in the school is doing a sport that then obtains you half of a gym credit. Many students participate in track, soccer, football, and much more, but dance is an art credit here at the high school.
With many inquiries from students about trying to make their outside of school, dance class count as a credit, the school has recently put out an online program that counts dance as a gym credit. This was sent through an email toward the beginning of the school year. Although there are some differences to this program from the gym class at the high school. First of all, if you took a gym class at the school, no real paper and pencil work would be done in the class. Through the duration of the in school gym course, you will be playing volleyball, tennis, and more. Whilst the program online would require you to do extra online work to get a full gym credit. This extra work is for the lack of learning “important components of physical education” as the email states sent out on September 11, 2023 to parents. Why would you be required to do paper and pencil work, when you are staying active by doing dance?
Secondly, looking through the Goffstown program of studies at other courses, such as piano lab, that can count as both an art and a tech credit, it is hard to find a reason as to why the dance program cannot count as both an art and gym credit. Although dance is an art form where you can express yourself, you are also very active while doing it. Taking these two things into account, an option should be made for it to be a gym and art credit. Granted, students will then have to choose if they would like the course to go under a gym credit, or art credit.
In addition to the barrier Goffstown has put up against dance, surrounding districts, such as Manchester, have allowed students to fill out paperwork with signing from their dance teacher proving they dance the certain amount of hours written down. Upon submitting the paper to the schools office, students would be granted their credit from dance. Taking into account that the dance program here at the school is an art credit, and they make it harder for dancers to get their gym credit through the online course, a conclusion can be made that Goffstown high school is opposing dance as a sport.
A sport, by definition, is an activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others for entertainment. Dance has all of these aspects. Individuals or teams can compete at dance competitions, or even go to conventions. To become good at the sport, it takes time and physical skill to maintain and perfect the activity. The high school seems to be ignoring these simple facts of the activity of dance.
So, will the international debate of “is dance a sport?” keep its home at Goffstown High school, or will a resolution come?
