The Rollettes
This fall, as part of our fall syllabus, we are pleased to host The Rollettes, a wheelchair dance team based in Los Angeles. Founder and CEO, Chelsie Hill, created this amazing team of dancers in 2012 out of a need for wanting to meet and make friends and dance together with young women who were like her. You see, Chelsie started dancing at the age of three and continued to dance competitively through high school. When she was just 17 years old, she was involved in a drunk driving accident that left her with a spinal cord injury and paralyzed from the waist down. She was told by her doctor that she wouldn’t be able to walk. Her response, “Forget walking, I just want to dance.”
While adjusting to her diagnosis, she got on her social media and invited six women, who were like her, to her hometown in California. After a few days of bonding through rehearsals, sleepovers, and girl time, these women became a team and performed in front of family, friends, and the local community. That was the start of the Rollettes!
The Rollettes goal is to “empower women with disabilities to live boundlessly and shift perspectives globally.” They use dance, social media, community outreach, education programs, and content creation to build a network for women with disabilities.
Three members of the Rollettes will be presenting classes through Zoom this fall for people with disabilities. Do you support someone who loves to dance? If you answered yes, then please consider enrolling them in one or all three of these classes. These classes are for both men and women of ALL abilities. Participants should be prepared to actively move, dance, and engage in activities by utilizing the webcam and audio features of the Zoom platform. To enroll, please call our office at 724-283-0990. Details for the classes are as follows.
High-Energy Fun Dance Class
Presenter: Chelsie Hill
August 8, 2022
6 p.m. – 7 p.m.
In a high-energy fun dance class environment, participants will learn an upbeat dance combination and practice the routine while strengthening and improving muscle memory and cardiovascular, all while creating a positive energy experience!
Adaptive Fitness
Presenter: Maria Rabaino
September 12, 2022
6 p.m. – 7 p.m.
A challenging adaptive fitness class that works for all abilities. This class will vary from strength training to cardio to mobility work. Any external cues or advice on the form is a goal for everyone to work towards, not a strict rule. The presenter, Maria Rabaino, says, “In my classes, something is better than nothing. I just want everyone to move their bodies as best as they can.”
Beginner-Level Dance Class
Presenter: Conner Lundius
October 17, 2022
6 p.m. – 7 p.m.
A seated dance class for all abilities! This dance class is at a beginner level and is adapted in multiple different ways depending on the participants’ injury/diagnosis. Dancing is fun, and that is the primary focus of the class, but dance also helps with range of motion, building core strength, coordination, and memory.
The following paragraph is from Chelsie’s story on her website. “From day one my dream was to be a professional dancer so in 2014 I moved to the dance capital of the world, Los Angeles, CA, and started taking able body dance classes at the top dance studios. It wasn’t easy at the beginning to be the only person in a wheelchair with a room full of able-bodied dancers, trying to adapt the choreography to fit my wheelchair and a lot of choreographers didn’t even give me the time of day. But my love and passion for dance outweighed anything that anyone could ever say to me and I wanted to prove to all of them that dance is dance, whether you’re walking or rolling.”
