Past Events
February
DODGEBALL:
Our first annual Dodgeball tournament was a huge success! The event was held
on Sunday, February 27th and benefitted the Brackenridge Children's Hospital.
We had 16 teams come out and play and everyone had a great time! The 22nd
floor of the Castillian Dormitory won first place in the tournament, and the
dance team actually played them at the end of the tournament (we lost...).
WINTER
DANCE CLINIC:
On February 19th Texas Dance hosted an open dance clinic. We had a great turnout
and hope that all of our attendees had a great time dancing with us! We had
a jazz master class and then learned 2 dances, one performance piece from
last season and one new piece that the team has not yet performed. Our next
clinic will be on April 23rd, be sure to come check it out if you missed the
one in February!
January
December
WINTER
FORMAL:
In
early December, we held our annual Winter Formal! The opportunity to dress
up and relax was a welcomed reward for all of our hard work this semester.
And of course, the girls tore up the dance floor and even performed a few
dances in our formal dresses for our unsuspecting dates!
November
THANKSGIVING
POTLUCK: Mmm...
there is nothing our team looks forward to more each year than our Potluck
Thanksgiving feast. Held the Sunday night before Thanksgiving, each of us
brings an item and we have early Thanksgiving, turkey and all, with each other
before we leave to go home! Though cooking turkeys, hams, and casseroles in
dorm rooms and cramped apartments isn't easy, it always turns out wonderfully
and pays off! Luckily, we're usually done with dancing for the semester by
the time Thanksgiving rolls around...if not, we might not be able to fit into
our uniforms as well as we normally do.
October
LONGHORN
HALLOWEEN: This year, Longhorn Halloween actually took place
on the day of Halloween! The event is put on annually at the Erwin Center
and provides an opportunity for local children to go trick-or-treating with
UT student organizations. Each group provides a booth with a different game
or theme, and some groups, like Texas Dance, perform as well. We sponsored
a booth where we held dance lessons and taught the kiddies dances to the "Monster
Mash" and "Thriller". Though most of the kids ended up just
freestyling, they all discovered that they loved dancing! Later in the evening,
we performed our Texas Fight kickline for everyone at the event.
PARENTS'
WEEKEND: Each fall we get to show off for our parents at Parents'
Weekend! This year we performed twice during the festivities. We provided
lunchtime entertainment at Gregory Gym for the Parents'
Association Barbeque, and were treated to a wonderful lunch thanks to
RecSports. Later in the afternoon, we danced during the broadcast of the Texas
vs. Colorado game at The Endzone Club in Moncreif-Neuhaus for the annual "Texas
Roadtrip", which was sponsored by the Texas Sports Association. Though
it was a busy day, we were glad that our parents got to see how much all of
our hard work has paid off.
P.L.A.:
Our friends at STEEL Dance Co. developed
a new program this fall in conjunction with Student
Sound Connection to showcase arts organizations at UT. Texas Dance was
honored to be asked to perform alongside other campus dance organizations
such as The Algorythms, Hip-Hop Culture, and The Roustabouts. Student Sound
Connection provided 3 bands, each which played a full set at the show. In
addition to music and dance, there was a visual art show beneath the stage
and dinner. We look forward to seeing P.L.A. gro over the next few years and
would like to thank STEEL for hosting such a great event!
BUDDY
WALK:
Texas Dance participated in the Austin Buddy Walk for the first time this
year. The event, which is annually put on by the National Down Syndrome Society,
was held in Zilker Park. Texas Dance, Texas Pom, and Texas Cheer all performed
at the event and the UT Rugby Team was there to help out as well. We stuck
around afterwards to play with the kids and sign some autographs and are looking
forward to becoming more involved with the walk next year.
OU
TORCHLIGHT PARADE AND RALLY: Every
year, we look forward to the OU Torchlight Parade and Rally put on by The
Student Chapter of Texas Exes the week of the Red River Shootout. This year,
the event was very exciting for us because we got to show off our new uniforms,
debut our kickline to "Texas Fight", and perform with Tha Fulz.
We worked hard on our kickline for months before the rally and are proud to
say that it was later featured on National News on MSNBC during their clip
of the Rally, which aired that night. We also performed a dance with Tha Fulz,
our favorite local rappers, to their new song "Throw Them Horns Up".
The entire event was absolutely amazing, and a big thanks to Texas
Exes Student Chapter for putting on another great Rally!
September
HARD
ROCK KICKOFF PARTY:
This year, Texas Dance held their first major social event of the year at
Hard Rock cafe on Sixth Street. We invited all stduent organizations of campus,
as well as friends of the Dance Team. The event provided the opportunity for
UT students to network with each other and for student organizations to find
out what Texas Dance could do for their group. We had a great night of partying
and dancing and are so glad that so many people came out to celebrate with
us! Thanks to everyone who joined us! We hope to make it an annual event,
so keep in touch with us until next fall and we'll see you there!
PARTY
ON THE PLAZA:
Party on the Plaza is an annual event held on campus each fall to schowcase
student organizations. Each RecSports organization sets up a booth in front
of Gregory Gym and entices fellow students to come join their group. This
year, Texas Dance held dance competitions for unsuspecting passers-by to come
win Texas Dance shirts, cups, and stickers. It also gave us a chance to recruit
potential team members and advertise for our Hard Rock social which took place
later in September.
FALL
CLINIC & AUDITIONS:
This fall we had a great group of girls come to tryout for our team! The clinic
preceeding auditions yielded around 100 girls and gave potential team members
a little taste of what the team is like and what kind of dancing we do. When
it actual came down to auditions, we called back around 20 girls and accepted
4 of them onto our team! Congratulations to our new freshmen: Lauren Baker,
Lindsey Pearson, Katie Powell, and Mandy Smitherman.
August
GONE
TO TEXAS: This year was the first time Texas Dance has had a
chance to perform in Gone to Texas, the "Texas-Sized" welcome party
for incoming freshmen and returning students. The event, which was held under
the tower the night before classes started, showcased a number of student
organizations including the Vietnamese Student Association, the Ransom Notes,
and Ballet Folklorico, to name a few. With a live apprearance from Bevo himself
and a performance by the Longhorn Band, Gone to Texas certainly did welcome
everyone back in true UT style.
CAMP
TEXAS: The UT Dance Team performs annually at Camp Texas, a three
day camp for incoming freshmen that allows them to get a little bit of an
edge on what they can expect at UT in the fall. Texas Dance was proud to be
part of the camp's entertainment again this year and hopes that their performance
inspired some of the freshmen to come try out for the team in the fall!
May
BOAT
PARTY: Spring Casual was held on a barge on Lake Travis this
year. Our annual end of the year social function included a cookout, trips
down the waterslide, and of course, lots of dancing! This year we decided
to make the event a Casual rather than Semi-formal to take advantage of a
beautiful spring day in Austin. Everyone and their dates came off the boat
with great tans and huge smiles; we're already looking forward to next year's
event!
OOZEBALL:
Texas Exes sponsored their first annual Oozeball tournament this year to promote
camraderie between student organizations on campus. Oozeball? aka mud volleyball.
Although we discovered that we're much better at dancing than playing volleyball,
we tried our hardest to get over being muddy and have a blast. Despite a rare,
freezing cold day in May, we ended up really enjoying ourselves being covered
in mud instead of sparkles for a day and are making plans to work on our game
tactics for next year!
April
SPRING
AUDITIONS: Spring Auditions brought forth the best and the brightest
of UT's up and coming dancers. The team had a great time getting to interact
with all of our potential girls and although we couldn't take more than 2
in April, we hope to see many of the other girls come out again in August!
A big congratulations and warm welcome to the team to Kristin Englehart and
Michelle Hoover, we can't wait to dance with y'all in the fall!
"EMOTIONS":
Spring Show was a huge success! A big thank you to everyone who helped make
it so great, and to all our adoring fans, friends, and family, we love you
all! Thanks for all your support, we appreciate it more than you'll ever know!
TEXAS
REVUE: Texas Revue was a blast again this year! We chose a "diva"
theme for this years piece that inculded music from Madonna, Tina Turner,
and Britney Spears. In addition to our normal jazz-style routine, we also
threw in a tap piece to spice up our act. Though we walked away empty handed,
we enjoyed getting to meet fellow dancers in other genres, singers, and actors.
A big congratulations to all the groups who won awards inculding Bhangra Team,
Old Kids on the Block, Communications Council, and our favorite beatboxer,
Ram Vela! We'll see y'all next year!