The Place has a range of opportunities for young people to dance, both as a healthy and social form of recreation, and with the aim of developing the potential of talented young dancers.
Centre for Advanced Training
The Centre for Advanced Training (CAT) is for children and young people with exceptional potential and the ambition to become professional dance artists. They are a national network delivering non-residential intensive training programmes for young people aged 10-18.
Each CAT delivers a programme of regular classes tailored to the needs of the student, including classes in contemporary, ballet, technique and choreography. The scheme supports young dancers, helping them to develop and access the world’s leading dance institutions, through offering intensive training, audition and career advice. The Place’s CAT programme was the first to be established.
Fund for Excellence
Although the Centre for Advanced Training is funded by the Department for Children, Schools and Families and managed by the Music and Dance Scheme, who allocate means tested grants to families who would find the fees financially challenging, this support simply cannot be extended to everyone.
The Centre encourages applications from talented children, regardless of their background or their parents’ financial circumstances. However, we are increasingly finding that exceptionally talented children are unable to complete their training due to the increasing financial pressure being felt by their parents in the current uncertain economic climate.
For this reason The Place recently expanded the Fund for Excellence, which distributes grants and bursaries to students in need of financial support. These bursaries make a real difference to those students who might otherwise not have the resources necessary to complete their training.
You can support the Fund by giving online or by downloading and returning a Fund for Excellence donation form.
Alternatively, if you would like to discuss supporting CAT Students through the Fund for Excellence please contact Stephen Clarke in the Development Department on 0207 121 1051 or email
We are grateful to the John Lyon’s Charity for its contribution to the Fund for Excellence for CAT students.
CAT Commissions
The Centre for Advanced Training is continually looking for new ways to enrich the current student experience through commissioning professional choreographers to make work on the students. These commissions enable talented young dancers to gain the unique experience of working with leading choreographers in a professional dance company environment, to create an original piece of performance. Young participants then present the work at a public performance in the Robin Howard Dance Theatre, at The Place.
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