Dr. Valerie Blanc: Movement & Repair

Valerie Blanc, PhD, LMHC, BC-DMT, CMA, has been a part of the Lesley dance/movement therapy specialization faculty since 2011 and as a core faculty since 2018. She is currently the Coordinator of the Dance/Movement Therapy specialization working with a vibrant team of innovative educators. She teaches in both the on campus and hybrid low residency distance learning programs and was a part of the design team to create the low residency curriculum. Her teaching work includes the DMT Theories courses, Clinical Applications and Supervision, and the span of Body Movement Observation courses. She has been an integral part of curricular redesign in these courses, with a focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion within the dance/movement therapy pedagogy both at Lesley and nationally.  

Currently, Valerie is a dance/movement therapist in private practice specializing in work with young children and their families as well as and clinical supervision. Her clinical experience has centered around work with children with a focus on work with attachment patterns and sensory integration work- especially with the deaf population. She has extensive experience in inpatient psychiatric work with children and adolescents as well as community mental health support. She worked for 13 years with the Boston Children’s Foundation implementing the Rainbowdance and CBI programs in acute trauma response and resiliency building utilizing the expressive therapies. She acted as a lead trainer in the Rainbowdance and CBI programs, traveling to Taiwan, Mississippi, and New Jersey in response to acute natural disasters in these areas.  

Valerie’s research interests center around the pedagogical practices of dance/movement therapy and building pedagogical theory in the field. Her recent research studies have explored the dance/movement therapy hybrid low residency student’s sense of embodied presence in their core courses as well as pedagogical practices of dance/movement therapy educators in ADTA approved programs. She was also part of the planning committee for the 2020 international Pathways to Practice: Conversations in Arts Therapies Education conference, as well as co-leading ongoing departmental workshops exploring pedagogical themes in the expressive therapies at Lesley. In collaboration with music therapy colleague she has also explored a critical perspective of the histories of dance/movement therapy and music therapy through a duo-ethnographic and arts based lens.  

With national and local leadership in professional organizations, she has acted on the American Dance Therapy Association’s Committee on Approval, collaborating with educators across the United States to assure educational standards for DMT education. She is also an active member of the ADTA Education Committee where she currently asks on several task forces addressing educational standards revision, critical examination of movement observation lenses in DMT, and revision of the application process for board certification in the field.  

Valerie grew up in Massachusetts where she now lives with her husband, two children, and pug. She is active in the arts community in Cambridge and dances with the Guardians of Isadora dance group who perform the repertoire of Isadora Duncan. 

Transcript

MVK (00:02.111)
Well, I am so excited to welcome Valerie Blanc to the Boundaries and Belonging podcast today. Valerie, you are an assistant professor and coordinator of dance movement therapy at Lesley University, and you have been teaching there for 12 years. Yeah, yeah. Well, welcome. Thanks so much for being here. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I'd love to start with...

Valerie Blanc (00:21.122)
Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for having me.

MVK (00:30.623)
hearing about your thoughts about boundaries and belonging. How do you think about boundaries when it comes to your work as an educator, in the facilitation process, in the curriculum development, in grading, and where does belonging fit into this work?

Valerie Blanc (00:49.294)
Mm hmm. Yeah, I love this title. It's I feel like it's encapsulating quite a bit, both from, you know, my perspective as an educator and how I hold space, but then also, you know, what I'm wanting to kind of invite from students in the space. Yeah, I definitely I aspire to be as much of a, you know, kind of to level the

the power differential in the classroom. So I'm, you know, inviting experiential learning and embodied learning whenever possible. I mean, it's a dance movement therapy program, so we're encouraging the students to be involved in their bodies and with their bodies. And I feel like that piece around boundary really shows up for, you know, because I'm inviting them to kind of go inward and...

tune into sensation and then also inviting movements that might be more external, but like constantly doing that interplay of what is a learning environment, but we're also kind of like dancing this edge of their own self-awareness in that process, because we're kind of inviting some of these therapeutic.

pieces in the honor of learning. So there's that kind of dance. And I also, I think in my own role, I'm kind of, and I've found this more and more with more experience that I'm bringing more of myself into the classroom. When I started, I feel like I was much more boundary and sort of coming from more of a, you know, quote unquote, traditional therapist role where I'm not really sharing a lot about myself.

Yeah, exactly. Exactly that leaning into setting up those boundaries. And the more that I gain in my own self-awareness in that process, I'm bringing that into the learning space a lot more. So I'll use myself as an example. Or I might, like this week, for example, there was a tremendous amount of upheaval in the global news with.

Valerie Blanc (03:09.654)
things that are happening in Israel and Palestine. And just bringing that into the classroom, the first thing, like how is everybody doing? What do we need in the space? So the boundaries, I feel like, yeah, I'm doing a, I know this is kind of audio, but I'm doing a little bit of a side to side movement and kind of a weighing of, yeah, of like dancing that line between that.

MVK (03:12.384)
Yes.

MVK (03:27.399)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (03:39.03)
And I feel like that invites a sense of belonging within a classroom environment. When I'm sharing more of myself and I'm encouraging the students to step into that space as well. The goal at least is to invite more of a sense of belonging to the group, belonging to the learning environment, belonging to larger sense of community for them.

MVK (03:46.999)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (04:09.427)
And that feels really important both in learning and then for future therapists. So yeah.

MVK (04:09.723)
Yeah.

MVK (04:14.211)
Yeah, agreed. I think that there is so much to be said about the authenticity of the facilitator and how that impacts safety, how that impacts connection in the group, right? In the therapeutic learning environment that there are so many interesting lines that are maneuvered in a program like this.

Valerie Blanc (04:29.038)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (04:34.722)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (04:42.978)
Yeah.

MVK (04:43.547)
I heard you say that part of, it sounds like part of the motivation to be more authentic and to loosen some of the boundaries around how much of yourself that you share is to decrease the power differential. And I'm wondering if you could speak more to that. What...

What is a power differential in a classroom, like the ones that you teach in? And how do you decrease that? Why would you want to also?

Valerie Blanc (05:13.605)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (05:17.534)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah. Um, well, I mean, first of all, I try as much as possible to just name it. Um, and I think it exists just by the sheer fact that, um, that this is a place where, although we have this focus on group and containment and hopefully safety and all of these pieces at the end of the semester, I have to grade them.

And I will be evaluating them, you know, depending on, you know, whatever the course is related to, if it's a supervision course or something like that, there's an evaluative portion. So that puts me in a position of, that it's not equal, no matter how much we try. And it's so interesting too, because I've been in this coordinator position, which is sort of like director for the...

the specialization at Lesley. And when I started, I was teaching just as a core faculty, adjunct and then a core faculty for a while. And even though I didn't feel like I had changed in the way that I was in the classroom, as soon as I had that title, I felt the shift from the way that the students were reacting to me, which it was just something just to be curious about and just notice that there,

MVK (06:32.919)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (06:43.166)
about me stepping into that role, put me in a different position. When, I mean, as their teacher, as their educator, I'm not in it. Whether, you know, whatever my title is, I'm still evaluating and grading at the end of the day, the same way that I was before. But it was just an interesting thing to notice that way. Yeah. So, yeah, as much as possible, I'm trying to...

MVK (06:58.603)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (07:03.479)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (07:09.59)
bring that into the space. And every time we start a course together, we're creating shared agreements, we're inviting the students' voice as much as possible. Yeah, and I find maybe earlier on in the semester or even earlier on in the program, sometimes when I might throw a question out to the group, that there's a lot, depending on the group, of course, but sometimes there are, there's these moments of silence.

like when they're leaning into, I don't know what the right answer is yet. Even though we're setting up agreements around, often it's not a right answer to some of these questions. Yeah, so it's always a goal. And as much as possible, I think being really explicit about that and what the expectations are helps to kind of create that equalizing democratizing of the...

MVK (07:44.006)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (07:51.422)
Right.

MVK (08:01.899)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (08:09.266)
classroom environment, but it'll always be there. So it's a interesting thing. Yeah.

MVK (08:10.877)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (08:15.627)
Right.

Yeah, that evaluation piece puts us in a power position. And it is also part of gatekeeping in this field, who is allowed into the program, who is passing a class, who is allowed to graduate. And also, of course, the types of internship experiences that our students have. And I.

Valerie Blanc (08:30.114)
Right.

MVK (08:45.683)
I wonder if you could speak a little bit to the evaluative process, to this gatekeeping term that really has quite a controversial background generally speaking, right? Just kind of how it's, how higher ed is nestled as a microcosm within a much larger macrocosm.

Valerie Blanc (08:57.43)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (09:07.534)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I think as much as possible, you know, just an evaluation, whether it's grading or it's, you know, we have several evaluation forms that are completed throughout different stages of the, of the program. I think as much as possible just inviting students into that and kind of like a feedback loop has been really helpful.

MVK (09:32.991)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (09:36.854)
for me to kind of, yeah, invite that in as relational a way as possible. So I'm trying to think of some examples, like with the evaluations, let's say around internship in the internship process, we're filling, we're completing a form, but we're, the expectation is that we're sitting down with the student and going through it with them and asking them if they have any questions, sometimes even offering.

them an assignment that's alongside that where it's a self evaluative piece so they can kind of define what's coming up for them around their own strengths and growing edges in the field. And then for grading, which sometimes I honestly struggle with, like how do I how do I give a numerical or a through whatever.

MVK (10:24.98)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (10:33.582)
grade to something that's so experiential and so connected to, you know, how do I, how do I grade someone's level of self-awareness and that kind of thing? Um, yeah, I think I, I usually kind of remedy that in my own, um, way by, um, you know, if, if a student completes an assignment and it's not really up to par on a couple of areas, I will try to offer them the opportunity to rewrite or redo a section with some feedback.

MVK (10:42.475)
Right.

MVK (11:00.683)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (11:03.346)
Um, you know, that that's a practice that kind of helps, I think, with that, that piece, because that gatekeeping question is so, it's not really about getting a specific grade, although those can be measures. It's more about, you know, is the clinical skill set there? And do I feel like they're ready to, um, engage with clients, with groups, um, and, and sort of, yeah.

all of those competency kind of pieces that are coming up. Yeah, yeah.

MVK (11:33.087)
Right.

MVK (11:37.427)
Yeah. Yeah, it's like it's the larger frame that we wiggle in, you know, that understandably is important for many reasons around like public good, around, you know, being able to hold space for trauma and challenging conversations. And some of that can, of course, be seen in the classroom and in the classwork.

Valerie Blanc (11:46.061)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (11:59.438)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (12:05.15)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

MVK (12:05.799)
And I'm curious, like, within that, what, what's, how would you describe your teaching frame? How would you, like, what is important to you as an educator? What do, both explicitly and implicitly, what shows up and how do you, how do you hold it and communicate it?

Valerie Blanc (12:22.507)
Mm.

Valerie Blanc (12:28.386)
Hmm. Yeah, that's a great question. I'm actually in the process of writing up a, you know, talking about the structures of higher ed, like a promotion package in which we have to outline. These are the things that I did, and this is how it connects to who I am. So the conversation feels very fresh in that way. Yeah. And a colleague of mine during the pandemic actually was talking about

MVK (12:37.899)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (12:58.65)
um she was calling it pandemic informed pedagogy and I really appreciated that just that idea of flexibility and I there's been a lot of writers who've talked about pedagogy of care um and I definitely kind of like ascribed to some of those ideas or more of um like a critical feminist frame um where um yeah just kind of leaning into that

MVK (13:04.532)
Hmm.

MVK (13:21.088)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (13:26.838)
democratizing of the classroom and not, you know, trying to reduce hierarchy as much as possible. Yeah, those are definitely some of the things I really aspire to and yeah, and a lot of the courses and the work that's happening both in dance therapy and in our department, just the idea of a critical frame in general has been a really helpful.

MVK (13:33.685)
Yeah.

MVK (13:39.051)
Yeah.

MVK (13:47.191)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (13:51.276)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (13:54.126)
piece to kind of lean on that we're not just taking everything at face value. Like here's the here's the canon of theory and that's what it is. But or more like, OK, here's the canon of theory. And it lives within a specific historical frame. And, you know, what groups of people might feel marginalized by this theory? What what is not being heard here? What are the voices that are included and not included? And who gets to make those decisions and.

MVK (14:21.368)
Mm, so important.

Valerie Blanc (14:23.246)
Yeah, and like leaning into that as a skill that we want to like hone for the students. That's been something that's a little newer to my pedagogy over the past probably like six or seven years. Just coming from my own identity as a white cisgender woman living in the US. And so I'm appreciating that because I think that sort of

MVK (14:26.537)
Yes.

MVK (14:48.66)
Enough.

Valerie Blanc (14:55.754)
um we were talking about transparency and just bringing that into the classroom like we are all learning here together and um yeah and how do we I guess it comes back to that question before as well about how to reduce that hierarchy and the power differential and things like that um while also acknowledging that it's present and that it's present in many other places too so um

MVK (14:58.335)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (15:11.996)
Yeah.

MVK (15:19.602)
Right?

Right?

Valerie Blanc (15:24.254)
Yeah.

MVK (15:25.295)
Yeah, absolutely. I appreciate you bringing all those pieces up, you know, because from the responsibility of evaluation and how that impacts individuals, groups, communities, etc. And then also one's perspective as an evaluator, as a teacher, as a holder of space and how

Valerie Blanc (15:42.05)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (15:50.675)
your perspective and my perspective are different just because we have different experiences. And yet some of those experiences may have made it so there are perspectives that one hasn't had to interact with or think about. And so I just really appreciate you bringing that up and how important it is to widen the lens around whose voices are represented.

Valerie Blanc (15:55.548)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (16:00.775)
Yeah, but we would need, this would be, we're gonna go just beyond.

Valerie Blanc (16:07.791)
Mm.

MVK (16:18.739)
and whose aren't and why. You know, that exploration is just so necessary, I think as life work, you know, and then absolutely in the classroom, a therapeutic classroom training, dance movement therapists who are going to be supporting all sorts of humans in this world.

Valerie Blanc (16:20.382)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

We have the solver.

Valerie Blanc (16:33.642)
Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah.

MVK (16:42.403)
Yeah, I'm curious what along those lines, what do you, how do you think about responsibility as an educator in a dance movement therapy program? What are you responsible for? Who are you responsible to? And yeah, how would you describe that?

Valerie Blanc (17:02.757)
Mm.

Valerie Blanc (17:06.97)
Yeah, gosh, so much. So much, no pressure, but so much. Right? Oh my gosh. But yeah, I mean, I feel like there's, I always have this image in teaching of like, like when you drop a pebble into water and you have these kind of ripples that move out and.

MVK (17:14.115)
Well, you know, we can't get it all in, but you know.

Valerie Blanc (17:35.098)
Yeah, I think that I keep that in mind when I think about my responsibility, because it's not just to that classroom and that even the content that I need to impart or actually. Oh, that was a very interesting hierarchical word that I just used. Let's think about that for a moment. Yeah, just the content that we're sharing and that we're engaging with. That was funny.

But that ripples out, like those students will go and work with groups of people and there's all these ripples that kind of go out. So that feels really exciting because it feels like the part of me at least that got into therapy in general was that desire to, you know, make change and support people in life. And it feels like the teaching, like the...

it expands out even further and the reach is even bigger. But then there's also a huge responsibility with that, I feel like, because the students are holding space for, people at their internships and then people at their work, and then they may end up teaching themselves someday. So it just feels like that kind of piece about responsibility.

MVK (18:35.744)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (19:02.902)
Yeah, it gets very big, I guess, is my... And then I get back to my earlier question about boundaries and it makes me think, okay, but right now, I'm just here in this room with this group of people and that's what I have to focus on for the next two and a half hours. And just kind of bringing it back to how I can be present with what's going on in this room and...

MVK (19:05.177)
Yeah.

MVK (19:11.975)
Hmm

MVK (19:21.085)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (19:30.682)
have the conversation that's supposed to happen right now in that way. Yeah.

MVK (19:35.304)
Yeah. So it's like this, it like movement of macro micro, large, present, right? Like ripple effect towards the future, but also right now, relationship, you know, you and me, you and them, etc. Mm hmm. Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (19:47.49)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, definitely, definitely. And I still get pleasantly surprised when things go well in the classroom where I get feedback from students. Like, oh, that was a really great X, Y, or Z. I don't know, there's like this pleasant surprise. And I don't always get it right. I'm not saying that there's a lot of mistakes that get made and.

a lot of times when things don't feel great, but when, yeah, that part in the now is a really exciting part, not necessarily related to responsibility, but maybe like the validation or the, yeah, yeah.

MVK (20:16.107)
Yeah.

MVK (20:29.079)
Yeah.

MVK (20:32.571)
Yeah, well, I imagine that the feedback that you get in the moment, right, the relational feedback can be incredibly validating in that, like, okay, I'm making the right choice as an educator. I'm connecting with this group in a way that's going to deepen our understanding of each other, our understanding of the content. And there is something, at least, you know, in my experience, that's so...

Valerie Blanc (20:55.59)
Mm.

MVK (21:02.387)
It's just moving. It's deeply moving to feel that connection as a facilitator.

Valerie Blanc (21:05.991)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (21:09.85)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

MVK (21:12.803)
Yeah. I'm curious about if you could share with us the courses that you teach generally and what you love about them. What brings you joy and yeah and why and how and all those bits.

Valerie Blanc (21:21.358)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (21:31.062)
Hmm. Yeah, yeah, definitely. Oh, I've taught. I'm not currently teaching, but I'm sort of supporting and mentoring the dance movement, therapy, theories and practice course, which is sort of the first, you know, beginning introduction to the early theorists in the field and also just, you know, exploring, you know, why is dance healing both

in when it was as it's named dance movement therapy, but then also the history of that long before anybody. So I love the part in that class, because first of all, the students are so new. They're just brand new. It's like their first, first class. And a lot of times they're bringing that story of, you know, what brought you to this work. I just love hearing people's stories about that. I think there's a tremendous like connecting piece there.

MVK (22:24.821)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (22:30.822)
So that's a really great piece. And I actually, even before that, we have an orientation course that happens with not just the dance therapy students, but all of the incoming students. So it's a huge group of students. We usually co-teach it with about at least 10 faculty. It's a really big, big course. But the energy of that space is like that newness. And they're saying, oh, I feel like I've found.

MVK (22:55.104)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (22:58.698)
I'm in the right place, I found my people. This is being with group of like-minded people who are there for similar reasons. That's been really exciting. And I've been a big part of changing the way that course is taught. So we had to switch it to online within the pandemic and we've kept it that way because it's been so much more, it makes space for us to be really explicit about.

MVK (23:07.957)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (23:28.318)
Okay, here are the themes that you're gonna explore over the next three years in your program. And we're gonna dive into them in this orientation in this beginning course. So they get a little bit of a taste of different things. It's sort of that planting seeds place, but it was such a great opportunity with my colleagues to just say, okay, what do we want them to know when they're first coming in? What are some of the...

MVK (23:33.655)
Hmm.

MVK (23:46.559)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (23:56.342)
the really important themes around expressive arts therapies as an umbrella, which was such a cool theoretical conversation to have. So that class, yeah, I really like teaching that class a lot. And I teach this counseling theories course as well, which is history of counseling theories, starting kind of from Freud to whatever, whatever more current theories folks wanna learn about.

MVK (24:01.683)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (24:19.959)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (24:26.295)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (24:26.934)
Um, and that, that class has been, this is only my second year teaching it, but it's, um, the, the design of it, my colleague was a drama therapist designed it. And we, we do this kind of simultaneous learning about the theorist and the theory. And then also each week the students have to put on like a, a DEI lens, like a critical race theory or intersectionality or liberation psychology and deconstruct the theory.

through this other lens. So every week they're doing a presentation about that and facilitating conversations. So that, yeah, that's been so interesting to see. And just, I think I lean on structure a lot, like creating structure and being as explicit as possible. And that's been a really, just that idea of, okay, here's a...

MVK (25:16.306)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (25:23.014)
skill that we want you to have, but here's a frame that you can actually use to enhance that skill. So yeah, I think the students who presented about Freud, I think it was like the perfect quote, they said, we chose Freud because we really wanted to rip him apart, but we ended up finding out, you know, all of the things that are really still valuable about this theory. So it was a really interesting piece in conversation. Yeah, yeah.

MVK (25:47.019)
Hmm. Yeah. I love that place of both and, you know, being able to rip a theory apart, understand the context in which it was created, and then still be able to find gems within it, even if it is located in some harmful, harmful perspective, you know, which we know that Freud's

Valerie Blanc (25:55.446)
Right.

Valerie Blanc (26:14.318)
Right.

MVK (26:16.439)
Theories are absolutely located in some harmful perspectives.

Valerie Blanc (26:22.166)
Right, right, yeah, definitely, definitely. Yeah, and the other courses that I teach are specific to dance movement therapy. We have some systems of movement observation that the students are learning. So I teach the level one and the level two courses in that. And we've actually been going through our own, deconstruction around frames of observing and analyzing movement that have

MVK (26:36.451)
Hmm.

MVK (26:51.211)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (26:52.042)
in a similar way, you know, lived in a context of potential harm because they're coming from a specific lens. So that has been really, really interesting over the past, you know, probably five or six years of exploring. It used to be that it was like this frame.

MVK (26:58.678)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (27:16.606)
Okay, we're just gonna explore all movement through this one frame and we can use all this language, which is very, it was valuable to the field, I think, when in the late 70s, early 80s, because we needed dance therapists, needed sort of, well, did they need, I don't know if we needed it, but it was sort of this idea that if we had a shared language that it would give us some more validity in that way. And now, you know, it's...

MVK (27:40.214)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (27:46.098)
Is there any one frame that can describe all human movement? Probably not. So now it's like expanding and thinking about teaching several different frames and doing that same kind of deconstructive process and especially around cultural dance forms and the ways in which, yeah, which different cultures view movement and dance and the ways in which

if we're leaning on one specific frame of movement, what do we miss as far as like what the dance has to tell as a story in that way. So that's, yeah, that's where I'm leaning in. And I was trained in the one frame that everybody used to use. So there's another both and that lives there. That's like where most of my knowledge is around.

MVK (28:19.327)
Hmm

MVK (28:22.711)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (28:35.156)
Right.

MVK (28:39.336)
Mm.

Valerie Blanc (28:44.574)
So I've had to do a lot of learning of other frames and a lot of research and expansion in that way. So.

MVK (28:51.671)
Hmm, which is such a gift, I think, from being an educator. We get We learn the whole time, whether it's in, you know, expanding the curriculum and doing research around that, or, of course, learning from each individual student, as well as the group dynamic itself. I mean, it's, it's so very rich.

Valerie Blanc (28:54.978)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (29:02.358)
all the time, yeah.

Valerie Blanc (29:15.225)
Mm-hmm.

Absolutely, absolutely.

MVK (29:19.919)
Yeah. You know, you're talking about dance movement therapy, you're talking about movement, and I'm curious, what is your teaching style as it relates to movement? Are you, when you're teaching in person, are you moving a lot? How do you use your body as an educator?

Valerie Blanc (29:27.662)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (29:34.25)
Mm.

Valerie Blanc (29:40.546)
Hmm. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I always tell prospective students I just met with one right before this call. You will not be sitting at desks in your classes. Like we're going to push everything to the side. If there is furniture in the room, it will be moved. Yeah, I always like to start with movement in some way. And and I. I usually try as much as possible to make that kind of a

MVK (29:54.871)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (30:10.45)
a co-created thing with the students when we're starting out in those early classes of those brand new fresh students. Sometimes I need to give them some experiences because sometimes there's a little bit of a deer in the headlights moment that can happen coming in and not really knowing what to expect. But yeah, I usually like to start with some kind of a movement check-in and I'll even throw it out to the class. Like what do we need? Do we need to be, you know...

MVK (30:25.379)
Sure.

Valerie Blanc (30:39.322)
laying on the floor in stillness? Do we need something that's going to energize us? We're usually creating like a class playlist, so they're sharing music that they like to move to and you know teaching each other in that way. So yeah, so there's usually, I usually like to start and end with something that is bringing us back into our bodies, bringing us into our bodies

Valerie Blanc (31:09.358)
from wherever each of our bodies are. And in dance movement therapy, there's a lot of kind of embodied empathy and sort of attunement to whatever's going on a movement level. So it's both like a diagnostic of checking in where the room is and what everybody needs. And also there's a clinical skill there, right? Of being, you know, kind of tuning into your own body and everyone else's.

MVK (31:12.161)
Yeah.

MVK (31:28.909)
Right.

Valerie Blanc (31:38.238)
in that space. And then throughout the class, if there's content, I try to do this kind of, what was the word that my colleague was using, like an oscillation between being in the cognitive and then trying something on in an embodied way, whether it's kind of like small groups or partners or if a student asks a question about

MVK (31:59.164)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (32:07.39)
application, let's say, instead of just talking about it, I'll say, let's get up and try this together. Like, in that way, I'm trying to Just this past week, a student was asking about, you know, how to work with moments when, when clients might be entering into a stress response, like a fight or flight in the moment. So we just, we got up and we tried walking around and engaging in.

MVK (32:29.686)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (32:37.002)
you know, kind of like titrating movement instead of immediately going to, we're just gonna lay down and close our eyes. Like, how do you kind of move through that? So yeah, as much as possible, like grounding it in the movement and the body. Yeah. And even when I'm doing more of a lecture-based class, I might even share something that's happening for me somatically.

MVK (32:43.34)
Hmm.

MVK (32:47.275)
Hmm.

MVK (33:02.76)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (33:04.022)
Like I'm talking about this and I'm noticing my heart rate is increasing or, um, you know, I could use a big deep breath right now, or I let's shake that off or, you know, just sort of like bringing it into the, into the space. Um, in that way. Yeah. So there's a lot of back and forth. Yeah.

MVK (33:14.004)
Mm.

MVK (33:17.085)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (33:24.139)
Yeah, I imagine, you know, that last piece that you're talking about, I imagine that that's just really important modeling to speak to your body's experience in the moment and to make space for the rest of the group to witness you in that and then to make space for them to do that themselves.

Valerie Blanc (33:43.948)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (33:47.854)
Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

MVK (33:50.031)
Yeah, yeah, I just, the body is just so important. The body, just in general period. And I think also as an educator, whether or not one is teaching in the dance movement therapy field, I think that coming back over and over and over again, that practice of returning to one's body is just a gift. And

Valerie Blanc (34:18.619)
Hmm

MVK (34:19.205)
so important.

Valerie Blanc (34:21.09)
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. A colleague of mine, we were, in 2020 we ran a mini conference around pathways to pedagogy and asking some of these questions. And this was one of the things that we were wondering, we had sort of this hypothesis that all of the arts therapies are embodied in some way, right? I mean, like,

MVK (34:23.452)
Yeah.

MVK (34:46.863)
I mean, yes, absolutely. I mean, absolutely.

Valerie Blanc (34:50.194)
That's what we're sharing. Yeah, because we're always whether you're in fine motor, gross motor, somatic, sound, enactment, it just all feels like, yeah, absolutely.

MVK (35:01.255)
Yes. Yeah, the body is a part of it. I guess I made that face because I don't know that all educators in the expressive arts spectrum are using the body in the same way as they facilitate their course. Like that's where my face came from. Indeed.

Valerie Blanc (35:20.994)
Mm. Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (35:27.795)
Your body was speaking in that moment, right? Your body was sending a message.

MVK (35:32.284)
Yeah, absolutely. You know, and with that, right, with our bodies, there's so much that happens and that comes up and, you know, you were talking about nervous system responses and how content can encourage heart rate to increase and can potentially encourage...

Valerie Blanc (35:37.558)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (35:49.208)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (35:59.079)
emotional responses and memories and interactions between students that, you know, feel like they're coming from wounds, right? And I'm just, I'm curious what, what can conflict look like in your, in your classes? And also how does heartache or heartbreak show up?

Valerie Blanc (36:09.669)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (36:21.43)
Mm, yeah, yeah. And I feel like leaning into a lot of these more systemic issues brings space for some of those things to come in because folks are talking about oppression and talking about microaggressions and all of these, all of these pieces. Yeah, I think.

Valerie Blanc (36:50.306)
I'm thinking about many examples in my brain. That's where the pause is coming from. But I think ways, When I first started teaching, I don't know if I could have held or did hold conflict in the same way that I do now. And I think it's sort of that letting go of one way in which to do that. I think just sort of as much as possible setting up those

early agreements around how are we going to hold, We're going to talk about difficult things. And we may not always agree. And how are we going to set up, you know, guidelines around what do we do when there's a rupture in the classroom and how do we move towards repair? Yeah. And I think just it's shown up in just sort of making space and naming that

MVK (37:33.321)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (37:45.506)
that a conflict has happened. Because sometimes I think students are ready to step in and say, you know, I don't like what you just said and it's hurting me in this way or it's offending me in this way. But sometimes they're not. So just even like naming and the body could even be a tool for this too. Like I'm noticing tension in my body when this interchange just happened. Let's make pause and make some space for checking in with each other.

MVK (37:47.689)
Hmm.

MVK (37:59.272)
Right.

MVK (38:13.248)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (38:15.594)
around that and like letting go of whatever we need to do today to work on what's coming up in the group in that way. Yeah, and

MVK (38:24.459)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (38:31.374)
Yeah, I'm just thinking about, I mean, the with the pandemic and within the US, like all of the racial violence and, you know, like a colleague and I co taught a class, for example, the it was sort of out of sequence for the students and they ended up we met on January 7 2021.

MVK (38:59.404)
Oh, wow.

Valerie Blanc (38:59.818)
was the first day of class. And yeah, just sort of, that is definitely a day that's kind of coming to mind. And my colleague and I had prepared, we just wanna acknowledge that this is going on and let's take care of each other, let's take care of ourselves in the ways that we need to. And...

MVK (39:21.184)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (39:26.158)
Yeah, and we did have a pretty strong reaction from a couple of students in the class who were like, no, that's not enough. You're not doing enough in the space. And it was actually, there was a confluence of that and also it was that movement observation class. So we were also saying, we recognize that this frame is not inclusive. And the student was saying, no, this frame is racist. And we were like, okay.

MVK (39:34.979)
Mm.

Valerie Blanc (39:52.802)
here we are in this moment and in this context of what's happening in the country. So all of those things were happening in that moment, conflict, heartache. And my colleague and I were feeling like, wow, like all of our plans that we were going to do for the next little bit are out the window. Yeah, completely. Including.

MVK (40:16.061)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (40:19.374)
what we were going to teach was sort of out the window. So it was like this real unmoored kind of feeling of, wow, the ground and the structure that we created is not enough in this moment. And like, what do we do with that? Yeah. And we didn't have the answer. And I think that we just sort of kept bringing that into the space and, you know, let's figure out what we can do.

MVK (40:27.9)
Hmm.

MVK (40:34.469)
Mm.

MVK (40:37.535)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (40:46.826)
together. Maybe this looks a lot different than we thought it was going to look. So

Valerie Blanc (40:53.334)
Yeah, I feel like there's been a lot of examples of that over the past many years.

MVK (40:56.916)
Yeah.

MVK (41:01.331)
Absolutely.

Valerie Blanc (41:02.386)
in that way. Yeah.

MVK (41:04.499)
Yeah, I think that there's in general been a trend of students really being confident in saying no and in saying this is wrong and in saying this is not enough. And I really appreciate the passion in being able to take one's education in one's hands and say,

I actually, I need this. And what you're offering is more of the same. It's more of the white supremacy that I've been surrounded by, right? And has harmed me and has harmed, you know, I mean, has harmed us all, right? Yeah, so I just, I hear that depth and I feel it, right? That there is...

Valerie Blanc (41:46.606)
Exactly.

MVK (42:04.375)
so much pain in that passion of here we are again in a classroom where either someone isn't represented or the frame is, you know, drenched, drenched in many, many isms. Here we are again and there really is just, there has been such a deep sense of more than frustration.

Valerie Blanc (42:10.65)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (42:24.642)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (42:34.163)
right? It's this heartbreak, like here we are again, you know? Yeah, yeah. And it really requires that flexibility and humility from educators to be like, oh, huh, I guess my curriculum frame isn't going to work. What do I need to learn here from my students so that I can be more inclusive? But What do you think about that?

Valerie Blanc (42:39.426)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

Valerie Blanc (43:00.166)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and I'm just really struck with them thinking about that usually the students who are the ones who are stepping into that role of taking their education and really demanding what they want are usually the ones from marginalized communities in that way, which is, that was a big piece in that example, in others that my colleague and I were feeling like, we should have.

MVK (43:32.983)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (43:33.118)
We as the people in power in this little microcosm should have been the ones to speak to that, not the students for whom it's affecting the most. So yeah, it feels like that. And at the time we felt like we were, but it was just such a minuscule.

MVK (43:43.959)
Mmm.

MVK (43:47.691)
Mm-hmm. Mm.

Valerie Blanc (44:01.494)
step, it was not enough. It was absolutely not enough. So there was a huge learning there. And I think, yeah, like you said, that moment of just letting go of any, you know, expectation of what this class was supposed to be and just being present with like, what does this group need right now from the rest of our time together? Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

MVK (44:19.788)
Mm. All right.

MVK (44:27.583)
Mm. Yeah. Yeah, I could. I'm feeling it, you know, and seeing you remember into it, you know, because it's it was and it is big.

Valerie Blanc (44:31.926)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (44:36.533)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (44:42.698)
Absolutely. Yeah.

MVK (44:42.871)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So if there's any wiggling that we need to do to just hold it and move it.

Valerie Blanc (44:48.726)
Yeah, right. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha.

Valerie Blanc (44:54.886)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's really big. Yeah.

MVK (44:57.695)
Yeah, big, so big. And it just again, that place of flexibility and humility, you know, which is not necessarily

Valerie Blanc (45:05.363)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

MVK (45:12.723)
I feel like maybe it's more new for higher ed, you know, when we talk about power differential and being a graduate school professor or a PhD professor and just the inherent power and clout that comes from that position and the structure of universities and colleges and how that hierarchy kind of impacts the movement of change.

Valerie Blanc (45:19.258)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (45:42.155)
Um, it, this, this feels like newer for higher ed, like, Oh, flexibility, learning from our students, humility, change. Okay. We gotta, we gotta keep doing this. You know, how do we do this again? Okay. You know, um.

Valerie Blanc (45:42.286)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (45:57.666)
Right, right. Yeah. And then it gets sort of replayed out from the top down, I think, a lot of administration when changes are being done. You know, like, we maybe at the faculty level are starting to learn those lessons and try to make those changes. And then we get kind of at the next level of hierarchy comes up or down.

and doesn't support that in a systemic way, which makes more exhaustion. I mean, it's like you were saying, the way that the white supremacy structures affect us all in those systems. And it feels so embedded in, yeah, and just the choices that administrations make, that presidents make, we're definitely dealing with that, my university right now. So it's...

Yeah, there's the ripple again, right? I feel like there's a little bit of a, there's a big block in how those initiatives get moved down the line. So living with those bigger structures feels.

MVK (47:05.279)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (47:09.578)
Really hard, yeah. The students are ready to make change. The students are ready to turn everything on upside down. Yeah.

MVK (47:10.88)
Yeah.

MVK (47:16.623)
Yeah. Yeah, and I imagine many, many of the faculty are too. And then there's all of these other, there's other evaluative processes that come from above the faculty. And even above the university. Yeah. I'm curious if you'd be comfortable in sharing generally.

Valerie Blanc (47:22.338)
Hmm. Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (47:32.8)
Exactly.

Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah.

MVK (47:46.219)
What other challenges that you experience working in higher ed? What are some of the things that you come up against and have to make choices around?

Valerie Blanc (47:59.982)
Um, yeah, that feels it feels very fresh right now. But that's fine. That's fine. It's a it's a good it's a good thing to process. I mean, I feel like just as we're as we're talking about the work within our department feels so connected and collaborative and um really doing a lot of this deconstructive work and even kind of across I have

MVK (48:03.217)
Okay.

Yeah.

MVK (48:09.792)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (48:27.786)
amazing colleagues in other universities that we've done projects with, you know.

So that feels really exciting and hopeful at that level. Yay, yes. But I think, yeah, absolutely. And it feels so generative and exciting and where it used to be this siloing, I think within our different programs, both in the dance movement therapy world, but beyond. So I'd love that kind of cross pollination or movement.

MVK (48:38.419)
Yay. Right. The creativity.

Valerie Blanc (49:05.074)
And lately it's felt that usually has sort of fed my creative energy and keeps me kind of in that space in the classroom. I think I think there's this larger piece around just major shifts in higher ed in general. Around budget around deficit around you know, like all of these like tuition hikes and

at our campus, they just sold several buildings, one of which was our office. So we got moved three times. We just had a huge layoff last week of several folks in the undergraduate program. So it feels like those larger systemic changes and decisions that are being made without that collaboration and listening to the folks that are really, that know it the best.

MVK (49:40.055)
Hmm.

MVK (49:48.683)
Hmm

Valerie Blanc (50:02.05)
So it's that administrative piece that gets. Yeah. And before it was sort of like the energy was enough to feed at that level, and lately it's felt like the pressures from above are. Yeah, they're really it's sort of it's encroaching on that creative space and energy in that way, for sure. Yeah.

MVK (50:25.663)
Mm.

Yeah, yeah. And that, and as we know, that's what causes burnout in our faculty, right? Being big, big changes that are out of our control or, you know, more evaluative processes or loss of certain, you know, certain roles or staff members that were supportive. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that burnout piece is just...

Valerie Blanc (50:35.562)
Yep. Yeah, for sure, for sure.

Valerie Blanc (50:52.518)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

MVK (50:58.407)
It's just a really important thing to hold with care, you know, because it's, I feel like so many educators are, well, there it is, or have been there already or they're currently or just really know where burnout is. You know? Yeah. Mm hmm.

Valerie Blanc (51:04.174)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (51:12.658)
Yeah, yeah, definitely, definitely. Yeah.

MVK (51:17.203)
Well, I'd love to shift the conversation back to the classroom. And I know that you have spent some time studying and thinking about and talking about the differences between online classrooms and in-person classrooms. And I'm curious, what are your thoughts about the differences between these classrooms? What are some of the great benefits to having an online classroom?

Valerie Blanc (51:22.007)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (51:35.544)
Mm-hmm.

MVK (51:44.875)
class? What are some of the things that have been lost in classrooms that are online, and what do you... and vice versa about in-person classrooms.

Valerie Blanc (51:55.894)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. So we at Lesley, we started a low residency program in 2013. Yes, 2013. So we've been doing that for quite a while. It was a really interesting kind of creative problem solving piece because it was sort of an idea that came from an administrative level and we in the expressive therapy department were sort of a little bit.

MVK (52:09.46)
Yeah.

MVK (52:19.532)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (52:24.318)
Yeah, exactly. Like eyes wide, like, oh my God, how are we going to do this? But we developed basically the students come for a three week residency in person in the summer. And that's the time when they're like really building their cohort and having those embodied experiences in the classroom.

MVK (52:26.115)
Ha ha ha! My street!

MVK (52:30.635)
Ha ha ha!

Valerie Blanc (52:51.774)
So some of the classes are totally in person. Some of them are hybrid and some of them are online. And since then, even with the pandemic, when that hit, we all sort of thought, oh, maybe we do know how to do this because we've already been doing it for a while. But yeah, oh my goodness. But the...

MVK (53:09.896)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (53:14.598)
I think the, I did a couple of small, like I did a small pilot study with one of our first cohorts. And one of the biggest things that they talked about was that importance of building on that in-person time. And they were, they were, they would literally speak about calling to mind a memory from the summer that they could recall in an assignment or, you know, that would.

and the scaffolding of arts-based experiences within, even within an online class. So if you have a discussion board post and the instructor is saying, here's the concept, now draw about it or sing about it or move about it, or having that kind of scaffolded experience and the ability to share creatively with your peers within that, even within the online experience was.

that those were the pieces that felt the most meaningful to their learning experience. So it was like cohort, team, all the things that we know about the in-person classroom, they were able to kind of translate that even when there was distance and separation. So yeah, fast forward to the pandemic, it was sort of like thinking creatively as well. So now we're all on the screen in boxes, but how can we...

MVK (54:12.499)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (54:37.618)
have as much as possible those times when people can feel like they can connect. Is it breaking them into pairs? Is it having them explore something in movement and bring it back to the screen? Is it kind of all of those pieces? Right now, actually, I have a small group of students and I who are doing a DMT and technology lab.

MVK (54:44.116)
Yeah.

MVK (54:54.1)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (55:02.134)
within our space, we meet once a week and we are discussing different issues that come up or exciting opportunities that come up within these kind of like online spaces. And what they wanna talk about most is how do you build community in those spaces? So whether it's classroom, whether it's socially, so a lot of our conversations have kind of centered around that.

MVK (55:20.712)
Hmm.

MVK (55:30.079)
makes sense.

Valerie Blanc (55:31.35)
Yeah, yeah. And belonging comes up a lot, like acknowledgement, you know, one of the students was high flex for a while because they couldn't be on campus yet. So they would be on a screen and the student the rest of the students are in the class. So it'd be one or two folks on screen. And just the

by other classmates or by the instructor to just acknowledge the presence of the screen, whether it's walking by the camera in a movement experience or sort of acknowledging questions in that way. So imagining as though that person is still a part of the circle was a really, really important piece to help them feel like they were still part of everything that's happening in the room. Yeah, yeah.

MVK (56:02.039)
Hmm

MVK (56:16.023)
Hmm. That makes sense. Mm-hmm. Yeah, that focus on community, absolutely. And the communal experience, right, like which is such a generative and important experience for feeling belonging, for feeling safe, for trusting the group.

Valerie Blanc (56:21.202)
So, yeah.

Valerie Blanc (56:29.496)
Yeah.

MVK (56:41.395)
you know, that is so important. So I just appreciate that's been a big part of the conversation, how to include and how to orient or reorient to connection and community when maybe we are not in the same, we're not in the same physical space.

Valerie Blanc (56:41.535)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (56:45.507)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (57:03.198)
Yeah, definitely, definitely. Yeah. And there's a huge accessibility piece, I mean, to speak about the benefits that we've just found that people who would not have been able to be trained in this work have this opportunity now. And then they go on to do really amazing, amazing things. So it doesn't feel like the training is, the training is just different. Sort of like they're able to really lean into that

MVK (57:05.44)
Yeah.

MVK (57:09.899)
Yeah.

MVK (57:18.315)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (57:31.99)
the preciousness of the time in the summer. And it's like a fast forward group dynamics, all of the things happening. And then it sustains. So those are the things that we were most concerned about when we started the program. And that's sort of been overwhelmingly positive and it just gives opportunities. We had one student who moved three times during their program and

MVK (57:40.299)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (58:01.918)
was living in, even in different countries and they could stay involved with the work from wherever they were. So, yeah.

MVK (58:10.523)
That's great. Yeah, so it's widening the community, widening the ways that we can include students. Yeah. Well, I'd love to end with talking a little bit about flow and also the emergence of the third. So in your experience as a facilitator, and I imagine in the residency in the summer, because it's an immersive experience,

Valerie Blanc (58:18.978)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Definitely.

MVK (58:41.827)
that there may be some interesting experiences that you've had of like this third way that just arises from the group movement or the group process and how that's related to just the flow of what's happening in the space. And I'd love to hear what your perspective is on that.

Valerie Blanc (59:01.122)
Hmm.

Valerie Blanc (59:06.026)
Yeah, absolutely.

Valerie Blanc (59:11.406)
Yeah, I mean, I think that's the stuff. That's the stuff. I feel like that's the, the magic is the only word that's coming up for me, but that, you know, just In a creative group, arts-based experience when that third sense, whether it's a physical piece of art or a,

MVK (59:18.465)
Yeah.

Valerie Blanc (59:39.458)
you know, like a movement circle and, you know, some kind of like a movement phrase or something comes through that everyone is joined in on. Like those moments are, I think, so powerful. I feel like that's the part of the expressive arts therapies that it is so, so it kind of, it's like, it feels like a little bit transcends

you know, people are whatever there's sort of that.

Valerie Blanc (01:00:15.466)
It's juicy. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Yeah, I think it comes up around, it feels like the embodiment of attunement in those moments. Attunement's kind of the word that's coming up, but it's not quite enough.

MVK (01:00:18.535)
Yeah, it's like even hard to describe in words because it's this feeling that happens.

Valerie Blanc (01:00:44.13)
But yeah, just that feeling of, you know, I keep bringing to what is coming to mind during the residency this past summer, I just held, we called it a dance jam space and we didn't really know what it was gonna be until the students came. But we have three years of dance therapy students and usually they're so busy in classes during the residency, they don't have time to see or meet each other.

So we just had a space and time. Some of the on-campus students came and we were just moving. We had some music on that someone had chosen and we were moving together in a circle and attuning to each other's movements. And there was a moment where someone started moving across the circle in a certain way. And there were like about four people that joined and they just kind of went across. And then on the other side.

someone started coming across with this really playful kind of jumping movement and then somebody else joined that. So it was like those moments of connection and a lot of the people in the room didn't even know each other that well. So it was like the first time that they were meeting but just feeling that sense of, yeah, collective and community and yeah, the third entity, yeah, that just kind of comes in, yeah.

MVK (01:02:06.387)
Yeah. Thanks for that description. I could see it and I could feel it. Yeah. Well, this has been really a great conversation. I really appreciate all of your experience and just the way you've narrated it and what you've shared today. Thank you so much.

Valerie Blanc (01:02:12.775)
Mm-hmm.

Valerie Blanc (01:02:28.846)
Absolutely, thanks for the invitation. It's great to connect. Talk about third things, right? Yeah. We did. we did.

MVK (01:02:35.539)
Right. Yeah, we emerged together. Yeah. Okay.