Let that fancy footwork do the talking Dance club president has his sights set on a degree in kinesiology

SHIR NAKASH Staff snakash.roundupnews@gmail.com

In Pierce’s North Gym, a group of nine students pays close attention to their 18-year-old choreographer, Patrick Ramos, as he demonstrates the carefully constructed movements they will soon practice together.

Every Monday afternoon, these students come together for their kinesiology athletics class, headed by Coach Jenny Ghiglia, and work on perfecting the routines they’ve created. The one-credit class is very new, born just this past semester, but for dancers such as Ramos, it has already become an important part of student life.

Ramos, who wants to major in kinesiology, has been drawn to dance ever since he started watching competitive dance shows on TV as a kid. He used to dance solely for fun, doing talent shows with his church’s youth group in elementary school. In sophomore year of high school, however, Ramos joined Taft High School’s dance team, and started dancing professionally. Since then, Ramos has joined three different dance teams, including Pierce College’s Urban Dance Crew.

“[The team] was Coach Jenny’s brainchild, but it was an idea which she never really had the time or the people to make a reality until this semester,” Ramos said. “So when she put out fliers that there were going to be auditions for a dance team, some alumni from

Taft, who also go to Pierce now, texted me that I should try out.”

Ramos said he actually didn’t know that the team he was trying out for was also a class he could receive college credit for. In order to add the class, students had to try out for the team first. A few days after his audition, Ramos received the add slip from Ghiglia, securing his spot.

“It’s hard to find people who do the same type of style, so what I wanted was to get people who are talented and who can represent Pierce diversely through dance,”

Ghiglia said of the process.

“They auditioned either as a solo or with someone else they felt comfortable with and ultimately

12 were accepted.”

Two members have since dropped out but, of the 10 that remained, Ghiglia was able to form a leading council. Ghiglia appointed Ramos, the crew’s main choreographer, as the team’s president, and 18-year-old Nataly Fermanyan was made dance club captain.

Like Ramos, Fermanyan is also a first year kinesiology major who came to Pierce after graduating from North Hollywood High School in 2015. She took a class taught by Ghiglia where she realized that there was no hip hop class or team at Pierce. Fermanyan talked to Ghiglia about it and the instructor said she thought it would be a good idea to open one.

“We’re very new so we don’t know exactly how we work yet, but we’re also a very positive team and we’re on an emotional growth,” Fermanyan said. “We try to build each other up instead of break each other down, so everything else just kind of falls into place.”

Ramos laughed that their team is indeed growing in every aspect except for numbers, since it’s too late to audition and join for this semester.

“When we started, there was nothing and no one really knew what to do, but now we’re growing in a sense of foundation and body,” Ramos said. “By establishing rules, guidelines, and hierarchy, we’re trying to set up the precedence of the entire club’s future.”

Ramos said that the PC Urban Dance Crew provides him with the perfect outlet to relieve stress. When he’s tired of homework or he’s feeling unhappy, teaching his teammates a new routine or choreographing a new dance helps him take the edge off and stay sane.

[For the full story visit theroundupnews.com]