Vassar to Offer a Dance Major Starting Fall 2026
The art of dance has been thriving at Vassar for decades, yet the College has never had an actual dance major. That will change this fall. Vassar’s Dance Department received official approval in June from the New York State Education Department to offer a major, a development that Dance Chair Miriam Mahdaviani said is sure to provide new opportunities for students, the College, and even the community.
“Approval of the dance major signals the excellence of the Vassar dance experience to prospective students, guest artists, and faculty,” Mahdaviani said. “Just as importantly, the Dance major provides students with a credential that reflects a distinguished education and profound commitment to the art form, bolstering their applications to graduate programs and future employers.”
The department has recently added new performance opportunities and scholarly inquiry to Vassar’s dance program in anticipation of the new major, Mahdaviani said. “This past year provides a great example of some exciting new additions: a new musical theater technique course, a cross-disciplinary course offered by Dance and Cognitive Science, studying and performing the works of iconic 20th-century choreographers José Limón and George Balanchine, and an array of guest artist interactions,” she said.
Just this past spring, members of the Vassar Reparatory Dance Theatre (VRDT), the College’s faculty-led company of student dancers, had the opportunity to work with renowned contemporary choreographer Jon Lehrer, who created a new piece specifically for the VRDT dance concert held in April. “Jon told us that this is only the second time he’s ever choreographed on dancers outside of his own company of professional dancers, because he saw who he had at Vassar,” said Mahdaviani. “And, in fact, he plans to add the piece that he made to his company’s repertoire because he was so delighted with it.”
In future academic years, the department would like to start offering lecture/demonstration performances at the local public schools, Mahdaviani said, and possibly performances in public spaces to ensure that the performing arts remain accessible to the wider local public.
As Vassar awaited state approval of the Dance Department's application submitted late last year, some students were already eager to declare a dance major. One is Annabelle Fields ’27, an art history major from Los Angeles who has been dancing since age three and plans to double major in dance.
Fields said she had not originally considered Vassar because the College did not offer a dance major. But after meeting John Meehan, Professor of Dance on the Frances D. Fergusson Chair and Director of the Vassar Repertory Dance Theatre, at a summer intensive program, she decided to look into attending. What she found really surprised her.
“I think it’s kind of a hidden gem,” Fields said of the Dance Department. “I don’t think a lot of people understand how incredible the Vassar dance faculty is—every one of them in their own right.”
Once she enrolled, Fields knew she had come to the right place. “I’ve never found a dance community that is both as talented and engaged as Vassar’s, but also as kind and welcoming as Vassar’s is,” she said. “If you want a liberal arts experience, and you still want to dance at a really high professional level, I could not find anything nearly as close to Vassar’s standards,” she said.