Expressions Dance Alliance

When I started college, I knew I could not give up dance, something I invested so much time in, and was so passionate about since the age of three. At the club fair during my freshman year, I found Expressions Dance Alliance. I had done some research on dance companies at Fordham, and had stumbled across Expressions' YouTube channel (which you can find below), but was not sure if it would be the right fit for me. Little did I know that Expressions would grant me the opportunity to dance and to choreograph in all the styles that I love. Additionally, it would also go unto being the perfect time commitment and intensity, while also providing me with the best friendships I have made thus far at Fordham!

Shot taken from this year's photoshoot!

Expressions Dance Alliance is Fordham's dance company that performs contemporary, jazz, hip-hop, ballet and tap dance. Expressions holds auditions at the beginning of both the Fall and Spring semesters, where we look for fresh talent to add to our company!

Expression's YouTube Channel!

Company members rehearse anywhere from 5-10 hours a week in preparation for our shows, one in the fall and one in the spring. The shows are usually held in Collins Auditorium, where dancers can utilize the stage and lighting to put on a professional-looking performance. This fall's performance, entitled "Gold," will be held on November 20th and 21st at 8pm - an event sure not to miss! Audience members will be bopping and cheering in their seats as dancers grace the floor with everything from fun, feel-good jazz numbers, to serious and emotional contemporary pieces. Can't make it to our fall show? Check out our other dazzling dancers, performance groups, and school-wide fundraisers like "Up Til Dawn," "Fordham's Dance Marathon," and ASILI's "Taste the World."

Want to see more Gold? Come to Collins on 11/20 - 11/21!

Written by: Katherine Kelly 

Making the Most Out of Fordham's 135 Clubs

Are you the kind of high school student who is an all-season varsity athlete, NHS scholar, after school volunteer at a local nursing home, school newspaper editor-in-chief, president of both French Club and Painting With Watercolors Club, and an active member of the Chess Club and Grecian Club even though you’re 100% Irish?

If you can relate, have no fear, most Fordham students were also stupidly over-committed in high school too.

Being involved in so much isn’t necessarily a bad thing- it usually means that you’re passionate about a lot of things and have a wide array of interests, which is an extremely respectable quality to have. It also helps you master the art of time management, and allows you to meet new people with similar interests as you.

However, being over-committed, especially in college, can also be a curse. If you take on too much, you not only overwhelm yourself, but also lose the opportunity to really immerse yourself in what you’re involved in. College can be a big adjustment for some people, so between classes, homework, internships, having fun with friends, exploring New York City, and getting enough sleep, it’s important to remember to only join things you think you will have time for.

That being said, I will now tell you that Fordham has 135 clubs and organizations for undergrads. That’s everything ranging from the Finance Society, to club sports teams, to Fordham Experimental Theatre Group to the Paranormal Society. You can pretty much find an organization geared toward anything you’re interested in; but if not, you can always submit a proposal to start something new!

At the beginning of every semester Fordham hosts a fair (in the fall around Eddies and in the spring in McGinley 2nd) to showcase all of the different clubs. It’s literally like a scene out of Pitch Perfect- the performance groups are singing and dancing at you, and every group in between is offering you candy and trying to get you to sign up for their organizations. 

Fall Club Fair Around Eddies

My advice to freshmen would be to get a feel for all of the clubs first. Talk to the people representing the club at the fair, take tons of brochures and flyers and free food, and do a little bit of research. Whatever you do, don’t sign up for a club right on the spot because if you end up not joining, you’ll still get tons of emails from them until you graduate anyway. After you’ve thought about it and figured out which clubs’ schedules fit into your schedule, join one to four of them. Join some that you know you’re passionate about, and maybe one that you’re curious about. You might learn something new, and meet different people. Also, be active in your clubs! Attend meetings, volunteer to work events, and maybe even run for an e-board position. Getting involved is such a great way to meet great people and truly feel like a part of the Fordham community. 

Expressions Dance Alliance at the Fall 2014 Club Fair

For a full list of the clubs and organizations offered on campus, click here!

Weekend Update

Kaitlyn McWha

Fordham has a lot to offer, but some of its most interesting affiliations are outside of campus. This weekend, I went to an event organized through the Concourse Group, a micro finance organization located just outside of Fordham's campus. I currently work for the Concourse Group as a micro finance consultant to small Bronx business owners. This Sunday, I went to a business called Scenyc in the Bronx with my colleagues in order to collaborate with entrepreneurs and to work on a business plan for one of our current clients. Scenyc is an awesome and innovative business incubator, and I'm so excited to continue working there and in Fordham's business incubator!

Scenyc's awesome logo

Linda Mule

This past week it has been quite busy at Fordham! One of the exciting points for the end of semester blues however was a part of this week- class selection! I look at this time of year as a way to plan out all of the exciting classes that I can take here at Fordham. Classes are added all the time- an English class pertaining directly to my major was added just this week! Another really awesome end of semester event coming up is Spring Weekend! Spring Weekend is the weekend before finals and is a jam packed (literally, there's a DJ and a band) with fun events from Friday night until Sunday night! It will not be long until we find out who will be our musical guests this year, but we know it will be amazing!

Martyr's Lawn during Spring Weekend 2014

Gianna Rosamilia

This weekend, I had an incredibly busy weekend. Friday and Saturday night, Expressions Dance Alliance (the dance club I am in) had their spring semester showcase. The show went about an hour and a half, and featured The Satin Dolls, Fordham's incredible women's a cappella group. Overall, it was a huge success and all of our hard work over the semester really paid off! On Sunday, my Global Outreach team had its retreat. Global Outreach is a really popular program at Fordham for cultural immersion and service, and my team's project is traveling to Bethel, Alaska. It was a really great bonding opportunity for my service project community, and I cannot wait to go to Alaska with them!

Expressions just before the show Saturday night

Nicole Pieri

On Saturday, my friends and I went to Ram's Got Talent, a Fordham talent show sponsored by the Commuter Students Association that was held as part of Commuter Week. The talents varied from beatboxing to singing, and everyone who competed was extremely talented. It was really fun to watch and was a great way to spend a Saturday evening!

Some of our talented Rams

Weekend Update

It's never a bad idea to bring home cupcakes!

Danielle Smith

This weekend I took a trip back home to Long Island to visit my family. To get home I generally take the Ram Van into the Lincoln Center campus and then walk to Penn Station. On my walk to Penn Station, I passed a Baked by Melissa where I bought cupcakes to surprise my family (and have a few myself)! I loved spending time with my family and they were especially grateful that I brought home cupcakes.

Expressions Dance Alliance takes on the Botans

Gianna Rosamilia

This weekend Expressions Dance Alliance had their biannual photo shoot for their recital at the end of the fall semester. Some of the girls from the company got together and walked over to the Botanical Gardens to take pictures to promote the show, "Dreamers". The Gardens are absolutely beautiful this time of year. The weather was perfect, and it was an incredible day to spend outside with everyone. Not only did we take some awesome pictures for flyers and footage for our promo video, but we got to enjoy the gorgeous scenery of New York's Botanical Gardens, which is free to enter with a Fordham ID! EDA's show this semester takes place at 8 PM on November 21 and 22 in Collins Auditorium, and features student-choreographed lyrical, jazz, contemporary, and tap dances!

Great food, great sights, and great fun!

Emily Tanner

This past weekend I went to ‘Broadway Bites’ in Greeley Square Park! It features a bunch of different vendors of the yummiest food in NYC, from Italian to Mexican to Thai, even some baked goods! It’s called a ‘pop- up market’ and will be on Broadway until November 15th. I had a super fun time in Manhattan with my friends trying all of the different cuisines and just hanging out in the best city in the world.

We loved the laser show

Kirsten Simons

This Friday after work, some friends and I went to get dinner at City Bakery in Chelsea. We had incredibly delicious hot chocolate with our meal and then headed to Brooklyn for the New York Festival of Lights. The festival took place under the Brooklyn Bridge, and it was incredibly fun. The festival featured art from several different artists, all of which centered around lights of all kinds, everything from Christmas tree lights and lasers to fluorescent lights and projections on the side of the bridge.

A beautiful trail at the Botanical Gardens

Anna Romagnoli

This past weekend I took a study break in the Botanical Gardens right across the street from the Rose Hill campus.  It is free for Fordham students and a great place to go on a walk or run and enjoy the fall weather!

Taste The World Celebration

On Friday October 24, ASILI, or The Black Student Alliance at Fordham, hosted their third annual Taste The World Celebration. This year more people attended the event than ever before, with nearly 300 people lined up at the door. This event, which took place in McGinley Ballroom, celebrated the rich traditions of cultural diversity, and was open for all students to attend.  The students that went feasted on delicious cuisines of all different cultures, including sushi, pernil, lasagna, cannolis, macaroni and cheese, and roasted chicken. They also were able to sit and watch performances from some of Fordham's most talented performing groups including Fordham Flava, The Ramblers, The Satin Dolls, Expressions Dance Alliance, Sláinte: Fordham Irish Dance, and other awesome individual performances. The emcees were absolutely hilarious, keeping the audience amused the whole time, and the event was an entertaining and fun way to begin the weekend.

The event's logo!

I am part of Expressions Dance Alliance, and when our group was asked to perform at the event, we were so excited. We chose two dances that we performed last semester to rework: Ooh La La and Last Love Song. On the Thursday before the show, we performed our rehearsed dances for the ASILI board, who put up little previews of all of the performing groups on social media to get other students excited for the performances to come the next day. We then quickly picked costumes that would work for both dances, and got ready for the performance the next day. All of the performing groups got there early to help set up, rehearse on the performance space one more time, and take a group picture. Then at 7:00 PM, it was showtime. 

The Expressions dancers before they perform!

Each group did an incredible job, and it was so cool to see a little presentation from all of the groups at one event because they all usually have their own separate shows. ASILI did a great job organizing everything, and I am already looking forward to next year's event. Everyone attending definitely left feeling like they did get a little taste of the world and some impressive entertainment while they were at it. This is one Fordham event you should be sure not to miss!!

Express Yourself

I began dancing at a very young age, and as I  grew up, dance has always remained a huge part of my life. When I was searching for colleges, my plan was to search for a college with dance team that I could audition for. I wanted to continue competitively dancing like I did in high school. When I visited Fordham, however, I absolutely fell in love with the school, with no mind to how I could continue to dance (because at the time I had no idea what Fordham offered in the dance department). In fact, I loved Fordham so much that I was willing to sacrifice a dance team just to go here, and so on April 29, 2012 I committed to Fordham University class of 2017.

The company from Spring 2014!!

Expressions at the Club Fair looking for incoming dancers!

The summer before I attended the university, I worked with a girl who not only went to Fordham but was a dancer as well. She told me about the dance club she had joined, Expressions Dance Alliance (EDA), and how on the company, she made some of her best friends and greatest memories at Fordham. So, on the day of the club fair my freshmen year, I sought out Expressions Dance Alliance for the audition date. I ended up making the company, and it has been one of the greatest things to happen to me at Fordham thus far. I love all of the girls in the company, and I  found a way to keep dance in my life when I had thought I had lost it.

Practicing on stage before our show!!

Expressions is student-run, and our dances are student-choreographed, so my second semester on the company, I got a chance to choreograph a dance for our recital. Any girl in the company can audition a dance to choreograph, and if it makes it past choreography auditions, dancers will vote to be in it, and it will be in the show. Each choreographer's dance practices for one hour a week, and every dancer must come for a three hour rehearsal on Sunday nights (one for class, and two for company dances). At the end of every semester, we have two shows, usually in Collins auditorium. Friends and family can finally see what we've spent hours working for the whole semester!

EDA has been such an awesome part of my Fordham experience, and a great outlet that takes me away from the stress of college; however, it is not the only other dance club/team that Fordham has. Flava is Fordham's incredible hip-hop club, and the Dance Team performs at sporting events and keeps the fans excited! 

So far this semester, Expressions has welcomed five fantastic new dancers, and we are currently rehearsing for our show in late November! We have our first company event tomorrow night, and are so excited to see where the rest of our Fall 2014 company goes.