Researching Participation Pathways for Australian Dancers

Written By Patternmakers

Dance schools play a vital role for families, communities and Australia's professional dance sector, but the pandemic has impacted their work.

In 2023, we were commissioned by The Australian Ballet (TAB) and The Australian Ballet School (ABS) to conduct research into participation pathways for Australian dancers. 560 stakeholders, including dance teachers, studio owners, students and parents of students, participated in this project, and many expressed support for change in the dance industry. 

The project aimed to help The Australian Ballet and The Australian Ballet School better understand the current landscape of dance participation in Australia, identify motivations and barriers and investigate how wider and more diverse participation in ballet can be encouraged.

Download the Fact Sheet

Click the button below to read the full story, including statistics around enrolment, diversity of participation, and areas of opportunity within the dance sector. 

Each year, around 80 dancers are employed at TAB and around 100 students train at ABS, with most emerging from amongst the 4,000 private dance studios operating in Australia.

We found that financial barriers are a significant roadblock inhibiting the ability of some to discover dance, with 67% of dance teachers and 54% of parents/caregivers and past/current students seeing this as a barrier to enrolling. 

“Dance is so expensive, and we make so many sacrifices so our girls can dance...

Even though dancing at The Australian Ballet School is my eldest daughter’s dream, we just can’t cut back anymore to make it happen.””
— Parent/caregiver, regional NSW

There is also strong support to continue the momentum towards increasing diverse representation in dance, with 95% of respondents believing that dance should be accessible for people of all backgrounds. 

The research demonstrates that TAB and ABS are positioned to continue leading and supporting change across the ballet and dance sectors, in partnership with organisations such as The Royal Academy of Dance, NAISDA, Blakdance, Bangarra, AusDance, state dance organisations and others. 

“It’s a really important time in the ballet world to have an honest conversation about this and look at the profession and try to make a difference.”
— Andrew Murphy, Artistic Teacher of Classical Dance and Ballet Master at ABS



Tips for private dance studios

TAB and ABS are grateful to the many dance teachers and dance school owners who participated in this research. Based on the ideas and experiences shared by these professionals, we’ve compiled a checklist of insights for private dance studios:

If you have any thoughts or questions about the research, get in touch with us via info@thepatternmakers.com.au.

Image Credit: australianballet.com.au/our-dancers

Those invested in the dance sector, may be interested to read other recent research about the industry, including:

 
 

Explore more Patternmakers projects:

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