Yes, you can. From our department website: “The B.A. in Dance thoroughly integrates learning to dance, learning to make dances, and critical interrogation of dance as a cultural practice.”

What this means relative to the audition, is that the major has a vast conception of what it means to dance and move, and deeply considers context, history, and culture. Our program is particularly sought by people who dance outside of class, which includes and embraces movement learned and done in social, cultural, and/or community settings.

Currently, the Dance major at UCLA has decided that all-video auditions for the supplemental evaluation is the most student-centered solution for the time being. Here is the area’s reasoning, in no particular order:

All-video auditions are the most accessible for the greatest number of students. As a public institution, we strive to remove as many barriers as we can to quality arts education, and video applications solve for financial, logistical, and health barriers for students who for those and other reasons, would struggle to attend a live audition.

During the Fall 2021 and 2022 cycles which were all remote due to COVID, the faculty found that seeing video audition material in the same moment as an applicant’s academic record and supplemental essays specific to dance and their interest in the program, felt more holistic to them and allowed them to more accurately assess a good fit for the curriculum from a diversity of artistic and academic angles. Additionally, seeing all of the applicants with the exact same admission content and presentation contributed to greater equity in the review, and reduced fatigue and concerns of implicit bias on the part of the reviewers because they had more time to evaluate.

The Dance faculty acknowledge that there is a perception in the performing arts around attending a live audition as an indication that you are “serious” about applying here, and that if you don’t attend a live audition, that somehow means you are less serious. We do not wish to create this assumption around our programs— if you apply, then we consider you to be a serious applicant. We also know that we are a highly selective program, with far more applicants than we have space for, and we want to be transparent about what we value in the admission process; showing up in person isn’t one of those things.

This was not an easy choice to make, as we all truly love to see talented, passionate, inspired young people in person, doing what they do best. And we also want to take any and all opportunities we can to be a part of positive change, hopefully make the admission process less burdensome for students, and enable the department to run an equitable, respectful, and comprehensive evaluation.

Here is a link to a document that is a collection of evaluator thoughts and impressions about seeing video applications.

Every year some of our applicants have injuries that make it difficult for them to dance to their fullest potential for the audition.

On behalf of the UCLA Dance community, we all understand how frustrating it is to be injured heading into any audition process, when the timeline is so short and is so consequential.

As far as UCLA Dance is concerned, we all encourage you to prioritize your long-term health. We have always taken the position that your ability to dance and move for as long as you can should be your focus. All of us know that pushing through on injuries can contribute to greater and more long-term damage, which would also affect your ability to dance far beyond this brief moment of college auditions. Taking the time to heal properly now is worth that investment.

If you have videos taken before your injury, you are welcome to use those for the supplement, and explain briefly in the application that they were not videos prepared specifically for the audition process, due to your being injured. You know your dancing best. How your current available media documentation lines up with the Choreography and Movement aspects of the video audition is going to be a place where you select the best fit.

Also remember, that your current ability to move your body is not everything that we are considering: your writing, academics, and community engagement are all important to us as well, so there are still many places within the application where other stars in your constellation can shine brightly.

We trust you and wish you the very best for your recovery.