Weekend Crush: Lora Hill, Fights Bullying with Dance | Flexines: Weekend Crush: Lora Hill, Fights Bullying with Dance

Friday, March 21, 2014

Weekend Crush: Lora Hill, Fights Bullying with Dance

"You know when Lora came to me a couple years ago with the idea, the first words that came out of her mouth were, it could be chaotic, it could be...' And I said 'Great!'"

Awesome. This is principal Kelly Halvorsen's response to a project to change high school kids' lives through dance. Lora had this crazy idea to get kids dancing on Friday mornings and it had some really interesting results.
























"When it comes to music, we all stand together" --Lora Hill

Every Friday morning she sets up speakers and turns on the music. What's really cool is that all sorts of students join right in--even teachers dance. It is amazing to see everyone moving together; there are no words, just unity. You can watch video of it at the Ed Moments website. Ed moments is supported by Education Minnesota, a union of 70,000 Minnesotan educators and staff. Remember who else is Minnesotan? Uh huh, yours truly. I am so proud that our teachers are spreading this. I'm convinced that Minnesota has the best teachers (we certainly have awesome public schools) and it was my teachers that made me believe in myself in spite of growing up with an abusive mother.

“I know what can happen to the bullied,” she says. “Suicide. But I also know what can happen to bullies. Prison. “I’m committed to both.”

It's all about confidence. If you can give a student confidence you give them the power to be who they want to be. That kind of strength can stop both students from needing to victimize and students from allowing themselves to be bullied. This reminds me of the strength our pole dance community draws from engaging our bodies for expression and fitness. We come together because we are working on common fitness goals and we learn to embrace differences. That's powerful. I love what Lora Hill is doing and I hope she inspires people to find creative solutions rather than repeating the same hollow messages of what not to do. After all, unity and strength comes from action.

Photo: Lockers by Phil Roeder. Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 License.


2 comments:

  1. That is such an awesome movement. :) Bullying is no joke, so it's nice to see people taking a stand against it and doing their best to help students not just build confidence, but interact with one another. Personally, I think it can be a little harder to target someone if you know them, or at least are acquainted with them.

    Jenn, x@jenn.nu
    http://www.jenn.nu

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  2. What a brilliant idea! Dance is so expressive and to use it like this is genius. I hope her dance-shop achieves it's goal x
    http://bellalovesbear.blogspot.co.uk

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