Then, in 2018, came the doctorate program at Teachers College and the establishment there of the Arnhold Institute for Dance Education Research, Policy & Leadership. “We need research,” said Barbara Bashaw, the Arnhold Professor of Practice in Dance Education. “Our students are getting jobs before they graduate.”
One of the first graduates was Chell Parkins. The program, she said, provides her with the theory and scholarship to promote dance education more effectively. That’s what he’s doing now as the first Arnhold Director of Dance Education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
NOTE THIS OF ACCOMPLISHMENTS could not have happened without Arnhold’s strategic vision. It also couldn’t have happened without Arnhold money. “I had something I wanted to do, and John supported every one of my ideas as they grew,” Arnhold said. “That was not given, and I’m very lucky. I married the right man.”
He built a pipeline, a network, an army. The institutions he founded are almost exclusively led by people he inspired, taught, pushed and supported, who took his advice and promoted his ideas. That one person can have so much influence that it can cause trouble for some. But it makes many beneficiaries happy.
“He sees people’s potential and helps them realize it,” said Finkelstein, who just finished his doctorate from Teachers College. “He can spend that money on anything. He spends it on dance and dance education.”
“It’s just not me anymore,” Arnhold said. “All these people got the message.” And he’s not done yet. There are still hundreds of public schools in New York City without dance teachers. “Then there’s the rest of the state, and the country, and the world,” he said, laughing.
“I want to tighten the web so that no one escapes dance education.”