College Tips for Dancers: Pair These Minors with your Dance Major
As an upperclassman in college, you are faced with a lot of decisions. Maybe you’re thinking of moving to your first off-campus apartment. You may be trying to decide what club or organization you want to join. One of the most pressing decisions you’ll face, however, is whether you want to pair a minor of study with your major, and if so, what you want it to be in.
If you’re majoring in dance, the following minors are great potential fields of study to enhance your dance experience. Read on to learn about what you’d learn in each minor, and how it can affect your future dance career.
Related: College Tips for Dancers: Adjusting to Living Away From Home
Business-Related Minors
Business
With a minor in business, you will learn the necessary skills to be successful in any future business-related career moves you intend to make. You’ll enhance soft skills such as networking, negotiating, and customer service. You’ll also learn more about sales, business operations, supply chain management, and human resources. All of these things can complement your dance major by offering you the lessons you’ll need to succeed as a dance teacher, studio owner, or as a freelance dancer.
Related: The Pros & Cons of Freelance Dancing
Marketing
Marketing is a specific aspect of business that focuses on everything necessary to keep people aware of, interested in, and engaged in whatever product or service you offer. With a minor in marketing, you’ll explore lessons about sales techniques, communications, branding, advertising, and public relations. You’ll not only learn how to define your ideal target audience, but also how to connect with them. This can complement your dance major if you hope to become a social media influencer, start your own dancewear line, or promote any other dance-related business or service.
Creative Minors
Photography
If you have a keen eye for capturing captivating scenes on camera, photography is a perfect minor to pair with your dance major. Whether it be still shots or film, you will learn how to compose beautiful images after studying angles, lines, lighting, and movement from behind the lens. You can even use what you learn to enhance your own posture as a dancer. Over time, you may decide to become a photographer who specializes in dance photography.
Related: Tips for Capturing Quality Dance Photos with photographer Shoccara Marcus
Theater
A multifaceted dancer is a force to be reckoned with. Singing, acting, costume design, stage lighting, and being a general savant - both onstage and backstage - are all rewarding additions to your dance talent. A minor in theater can help you gain experience in all of these fields. As a dancer, having a deeper understanding of the mechanisms behind a production can help you feel more comfortable and knowledgeable when performing.
Health-Related Minors
Kinesiology
Kinesiology is defined as the study of the body’s movement, and is typically used to help people heal from injuries and improve their mobility through gentle, targeted movements and exercises. As a dancer major with this minor, you will learn more about your own body and how to prevent and recover from any injuries you may encounter. This is very important if you plan to dance for several years into adulthood. You’ll also set yourself up for a potential career path in helping others do the same.
Nutritional Sciences and Wellness
To be healthy means having a healthy body, spirit, and mind. With a minor in nutritional sciences, you will learn how to formulate a healthy diet for optimal performance. A diet is not just food-related, though. A person’s diet also includes their thinking patterns, sleeping schedule, daily habits, exercise routines, and more. Pairing this minor with your dance major will help you become a healthier person, and in turn, a better dancer. You’ll also become a trusted resource to family, friends, and future clients as a wellness expert.
No matter what decision you make, remember - you don’t have to have everything all figured out, ever. What’s important is that you trust your gut and follow your interests as they are relevant to you, then see where that takes you!