On Wednesday 3rd of February, Sydney Russell School entered their first ever Dance Competition to represent Barking and Dagenham at the London Youth Games 2016. There were 25 Schools who traveled from all over London to compete, with the hope of being crowned London Youth Games Dance Champions. The event took place at the 7,500 seat Copper Box Arena, with over 600 performers ready to showcase their talent. Students were excited to perform at the event and slightly nervous as we were not able to predict what the standard of the competition would be like.

Our KS3 quirky, back flipping street dance routine, `Egor Comes Alive’, was excellently choreographed by Koby T. (Y9) and performed with Elton M. (Y9), Kiyah H. (Y8) and Armandas V. (Y7). The piece received great applause and fantastic feedback from the judges.

This unique street dance style was contrasted by our KS4 piece, an original and eerie, contemporary dance routine, `Where have all the Children Gone?’, which was jointly choreographed by GCSE Dance Students Rebecca H. and Amy W. It left the audience in awe and leaping out of their seats. The piece was also performed by Year 7 students Joy & Jewel A., Cherish A., Jessica G. and Grace W.

The vast majority of Schools had groups of between 18-25 students performing and the dances were choreographed by their teachers! The standard of competition was extremely high and Sydney Russell students did us proud for coming in, at a very respectable, 6th place for KS3 and 7th place for KS4. We can hold our heads high knowing that even with smaller groups, the choreography and performance quality of our pieces, were strong enough that we ended up sitting comfortably within the top ten spots for both heats. Now we know what we are up against, we will be ready to move up to top 5 and hopefully bring back some medals for 2017! Students thoroughly enjoyed the experience of not only performing, but having the opportunity to watch other talented students and meeting other like minded individuals.

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