# **2020 - 2021** ANNUAL REPORT **PREPARED BY LIZ ALLUM - EXECUTIVE PRODUCER AND THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES** h e l l o @ d a n c e r e a d i n g . c o m @ d a n c e _ r e a d i n g w w w . d a n c e r e a d i n g . c o m ## INTRODUCTION FROM THE CHAIR This is our first Annual Report as a registered charity which covers the financial year January - December 2021. Dance Reading has evolved from its starting point as a development organisation in 2014, and we feel it is important to record our journey from that point to becoming a registered charity in December 2020. Dance Reading has not only survived the pandemic, but has thrived. With a huge expansion of our community work that aims to support people to overcome barriers to dance, and to get them accessing the amazing dance provided by the professionals in this town and beyond. We have worked hard building networks and connections and supporting the wider dance sector with professional development training. And our digital festival reached new audiences, aiming to inspire a love of dance. Post pandemic, we continue to tackle the mental health challenges faced by both young and old through a lively programme of dance for all ages and abilities. We are excited to see where the next year takes us. Danielle Corbishley, Chair of Trustees ## HOW IT STARTED Dance Reading, previously known as Junction Dance, was founded in 2014, when a group of arts professionals, dancers, producers, writers and teachers got together to consider how to strengthen and raise the profile of the dance landscape in Reading. Whilst there were, and still are, hundreds of dance schools and clubs teaching thousands of young people and adults to dance, there were no venues programming dance, very few accessible and affordable performance spaces and no professional development for dancers locally. We consulted extensively with the dance sector in the area, finding out their needs, their skills, their interests and their hopes for the future. We started by addressing the need for professional development through a programme of skill sharing, and then we moved on to our first month long festival in November 2016. Since then, Dance Reading has grown and grown, and in 2020 we constituted as a Charitable Incorporated Organisation with objectives based on our firm belief that dance and movement are invaluable tools to improve the lives and wellbeing of our wider community. The community work we had been undertaking since 2014 has grown extensively, and the professional programme and festival continues to bring new and exciting dance to Reading, as well as providing a platform for, and showcasing, the dance talent that exists locally. ## THE TEAM 20-21 We are very lucky to have a fantastic board of trustees who worked tirelessly to support us and all our work since 2020. They bring a wide range of skills and expertise and we are actively recruiting at the moment for more to add to the team. We also have a dedicated team of regular freelancers that we work with each year, who bring amazing skills and connections. In 2020 - 2021 we also with an additional 37 freelancers and artists across our projects. ## TRUSTEES ## STAFF Daniel Cameron Liz Allum Executive Producer Irene Cameron Anuradha Chaturvedi Core Freelancers Danielle Corbishley Maria Trevis Grant Thornton Tom Ryan Sonia Brown Josie Norman ## VOLUNTEERS Annie Spencer ## WHAT'S NEXT As we begin a new year we have exciting plans, including two brand new commissioned pieces of dance in partnership with ‘The Place’, touring to primary schools around Reading, an expansion and consolidation of our dance for older people in two locations across Reading, additional community work for those who face significant barriers to accessing dance, and the FESTIVAL is back! We are, of course, absolutely thrilled to be doing live performances again and to work face to face within and for our community. **----- Start of picture text -----**
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## IMPACT OF THE PANDEMIC In February 2020 we were all set for programming another month of dance in the streets and venues of our town. By March 2020, everything had changed and we prepared ourselves for a year without a Dance Reading Festival. However, by August 2020 we saw how desperately the dance sector and the community as a whole needed something positive and creative to engage with, so we took the festival online! With funding from the Arts Council’s covid recovery fund, we were able to create a digital festival that was free or voluntary donation only, and reached over 1,000 people, in their homes, in the midst of a lockdown. With a hugely reduced budget, a new found set of technical skills, and a lot of amazing people, we delivered a packed programme of 15 events across 5 days, all online. It was important to us that the festival should maintain its ethos of ‘something for everyone’: for the professional dancers, for the students of dance, for the general public (of all ages), for those who love to watch dance and for those who want to get involved and learn something new. to PAGE 5 ## OUR WORK IN 2021 DANCE FOR MENTAL HEALTH 2020 was, of course, a strange year with our plans for extensive community mental health work being drastically changed by the pandemic. Nevertheless, we established a strong partnership with ‘Sport in Mind’ and with ‘Becoming Mums’. We worked closely with these two organisations to deliver both a programme of dance for mental health for mums and babies, and one for children and young people in schools. Tying in closely with the Partnership Investment Fund project, managed by Reading’s Cultural Education Partnership, these two projects also enabled us to train a dance teacher in ‘Arts Award Gold’ delivery, enabling her to provide students with accreditation for their hard work in the school. Whilst delayed because of Covid this programme is now being delivered and, especially given the massive impact that the pandemic had on dance schools and young people, is greatly valued by participants. Despite the challenges, we delivered 18 weeks of dance and movement for over 45 women experiencing perinatal mental health conditions. ## PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT The dance sector as a whole also responded immediately to the challenges of lockdowns and began teaching online the very next day. We continued to listen to the sector and to address their support needs in order to ensure that community dance provision was of the highest quality and that the community could safely access opportunities to dance. We provided digital safeguarding training to 15 dance teachers who needed support to ensure their participants were safe online. We ran mental health first aid training for 10 new teachers, to ensure that participants in their classes and workshops were supported and we set up a peer-to-peer network for safeguarding and mental health support amongst dance professionals. We continued to run dance classes for mums and babies, both outdoors and online, and, through innovative evaluation techniques, saw significant impact. Our professional development and training programmes integrate with and directly support our delivery of these vital community programmes whilst also up-skilling the sector. ## KEEP MOVING! Some of the worst affected by the pandemic induced isolation and loneliness of 2020 and 2021 were older people. Recognising this key need, we wanted to support them to regain confidence, to overcome months of isolation, to enable those who had been ill to recover faster and to overcome a huge reduction in physical movement, strength and flexibility. We secured additional funding and enabled over 20 older people to access dance classes when restrictions were eased and established a brand-new dance class for the over 65s, training two new dance teachers in the process as well. In addition, a new partnership with Age UK Berkshire saw us dancing in the Broad Street Mall and building the foundations of new work to support those living with dementia. ## TOURING MODELS We came back to live performance gently with a show performed in Battle Library in partnership with ‘Applause Rural Touring’ led by the Sonia Sabri Company. We knew that audiences would be cautious and that bringing them a performance in a familiar space, with small numbers would be a good place to build back confidence. This free performance was for families and reached 45 families whilst helping to solidify our relationship with Applause Rural Touring, who we are continuing to work with. We hope to expand on the model of 'rural' touring, bringing work to community spaces across Reading over the coming years and to build on our partnership with Applause, a rural touring network currently working across Kent and Sussex. ## TURN IT UP! We designed and successfully fundraised for a brand-new youth programme and holiday provision, with a particular focus on young people from the Amersham Road area of Reading, where knife crime and anti-social behaviour had been of increasing concern during the pandemic. We were aware of the huge impact of the pandemic on young people's mental health and when approached by colleagues in the dance sector and a young, newly trained professional dancer with an idea and a passion to improve dance provision for young people at risk, we were keen to put something in place to answer this need. The project itself was funded in 2021 and delivered in 2022, and brought together new community partnerships and established a model that we will work to expand ## FINANCES We have been very grateful to receive grant funding for all our projects this year from a variety of sources, including some new funders. Due to Covid we were unable to earn income from ticket sales or workshops and class fees this year. This shows a breakdown of our income and expenditure for the financial year 2020 - 2021 ## SUMMARY Despite the best efforts of the pandemic to get in the way we’ve been very busy! Over 350 participants, and 2000 audience members have actively engaged with our programmes and we have supported over 45 dance professionals to gain valuable skills to deliver quality community work, whilst building new relationships and partnerships with 8 new partner organisations. Particular thanks to all our partners and supporters, volunteers and amazing dance professionals who work tirelessly with us to create these fantastic opportunities for our community. Here is just a snapshot of some of the fantastic people we work with. |**DANCE READING CIO No.: 1192879**
(Formerly Junction Dance)
**INCOME AND EXPENDITURE ACCOUNT**
21/12/20-31/12/2021
**£**
**INCOME**
Arts Council Grants
13,885
Other Arts Grants
4,542
**Grant Income**
Earned Income
Box Ofce income
**Total income**
**EXPENDITURE**
Advertising and marketing
695
Technical & Production costs
3,285
Artistic Fees (workshops)
1,440
Artistic Fees (performances
959
Producer and Administration
7,124
**Total costs**
**Excess of income over expenditure**
Cash balance as at 21/12/20
**Cash balance as at 24/05/21**|**DANCE READING CIO No.: 1192879**
(Formerly Junction Dance)
**INCOME AND EXPENDITURE ACCOUNT**
21/12/20-31/12/2021
**£**
**INCOME**
Arts Council Grants
13,885
Other Arts Grants
4,542
**Grant Income**
Earned Income
Box Ofce income
**Total income**
**EXPENDITURE**
Advertising and marketing
695
Technical & Production costs
3,285
Artistic Fees (workshops)
1,440
Artistic Fees (performances
959
Producer and Administration
7,124
**Total costs**
**Excess of income over expenditure**
Cash balance as at 21/12/20
**Cash balance as at 24/05/21**|**£**


**18,427**| |---|---|---| ||695
3,285
1,440
959
7,124|| |||**18,427**| |||



| |||**13,503**| |||| |||**4,924**| |||11,316| |||**16,240**| file:///usr/local/liferay-dxp-digital-enterprise-7.0-sp3/tomcat-8.0.32/temp/document83737110/27/2022