Evidence of meeting #47 for Canadian Heritage in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was school.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Director of Arts Education, Confederation Centre of the Arts
And they didn't pay me to say that, okay?
Liberal
Stéphane Dion Liberal Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, QC
We'll see.
I would like to understand. If you mentioned this aspect, I guess it's because you think it's not targeted enough by the federal institutions of today. Are you arguing for a new program or some adjustments to the existing programs, Madam Reddin?
Director of Arts Education, Confederation Centre of the Arts
My fear of putting that idea forward is that there isn't enough money to go around already. If we are telling the professional companies, “You're going to have the same amount of funding, but you're also going to do this,” it's not realistic. To come up with additional funding for those types of activities, particularly in connection with smaller communities outside of the main dance centres, I think has a lot of value for the nation.
Liberal
Stéphane Dion Liberal Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, QC
Madam Fraser, you seem to agree. Do you want to add something?
Artistic Director, The School of Toronto Dance Theatre
Yes. There are three things: support for under-represented dance forms is very important, and that goes along with what Greg said; stable funding for excellence in professional training is critical; and absolutely the profession itself must be supported, and as Peggy said, doing that has trickle-down effects. Companies have not been touring the way they used to years ago. It's very expensive to tour, but when Toronto Dance Theatre goes to Newfoundland, we get an uptick in enrolment. If they go out west, we get an uptick in enrolment. It's very important to disseminate stories that we get out into the country and tour. That has been an area that's been really lacking in the last 15 years at least, I would say, and maybe more. It's very important.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gord Brown
We have only a couple of minutes left, but Mr. Yurdiga, you have the floor for about three minutes.
Conservative
David Yurdiga Conservative Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB
Thank you, witnesses, for being here today.
We focus lots on the art form and also on the funding. I've been told that dance is just as physical as any other sport. I am curious about the type of injuries that are involved and whether there are support programs to ensure the dancer recovers quickly.
My question is for Ms. Fraser.
Artistic Director, The School of Toronto Dance Theatre
There are injuries, absolutely. They typically are things like sprained ankles, shin splints, sometimes physical exhaustion. We have a physiotherapist who is one of our faculty members. He's not actually paid as a physiotherapist, but he advises us. We have a whole series of practitioners to whom we refer our dancers. If they have injuries we monitor those over time, and we give them a plan to be off for a certain number of weeks and to come back slowly in a certain way and to progress in a certain way.
We are pretty careful, but that certainly doesn't mean that injuries don't happen.
Conservative
David Yurdiga Conservative Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB
In your programming, obviously you promote stretching and whatever as part of your curriculum. Have you seen an increase in injuries because dance has changed so much over time? We see hip hop. We see all kinds of forms just as we see in the music industry where new forms are always coming up, so are injuries increasing because of the changing art form?
Artistic Director, The School of Toronto Dance Theatre
I wouldn't say so actually, although we have to be more careful because when we're introducing something new, then there is a difference in the way dancers work.
In the olden days, actually you would dance on anything. I sprained my ankle on the first day of a nine-week tour. There were five of us in the company. We were all in every piece, so what do you do? You dance. I think we are much better now than we used to be.
Director of Arts Education, Confederation Centre of the Arts
I think the science has improved how we teach. There has been a lot of work done on kinesthetic approaches to teaching—kinesiology, how best to train the body so that you don't just say, “There's that move. Do it”. You build towards that end result, but there has been a lot of difference since—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gord Brown
I'm sorry, the bells are going now. We have to end the meeting. I really apologize. We do appreciate your contributions.
We have another meeting a week from Monday to hear from a few more witnesses, so if you have any further contributions to this study, please get them in to us by early next week.
Thank you so much for coming today.
The meeting is adjourned.