Page 12 - Programming Guide

*Campus dances are currently on hold due to Covid-19. *
Title: Campus Dance Guidelines
Responsible staff: Paul Chelsen, Vice President for Student Development Responsible office: Student Development
Dance Guidelines:
Dance is one way that Wheaton College celebrates life and builds community. We seek to be consistent with our Community Covenant by planning campus social dance events that integrate our lives around Christian principles and devotion to Jesus Christ. We embrace dance that celebrates the College’s ethnic diversity and builds Christ-centered community. To that end, the College upholds guidelines related to both social dancing and dance events.
The Community Covenant codifies the official dance policy of Wheaton College when it states: “Campus dances will take place only with official college sponsorship. All members of the Wheaton College community will take care to avoid any entertainment or behavior, on or off campus, which may be immodest, sinfully erotic, or harmfully violent. (Eph. 4:1-2, 17-24; 1 Tim. 5:2; Gal. 5:22-23)”
These guidelines build on the Community Covenant’s vision for God-honoring celebration by describing boundaries for social dancing and dance events that respect the spirit of the Community Covenant, to love God and others.
Social Dancing and Dance Event Philosophy:
Wheaton College seeks to cultivate a campus atmosphere that encourages spiritual, moral and intellectual growth. Out of our love for each other, at times, members of the community give up individual freedom for the growth of the Christ-like community.
The dance guidelines seek to live within the tensions of the God-given freedom we enjoy as members of a temporary Christian community while avoiding legalism. The intent of the dance guidelines is to create opportunities for the Wheaton Community to celebrate dance as a form of cultural expression and for that experience to be one that encourages mutual edification and the glorification of God. The guidelines also seek to create a space for those who wish to enjoy dance in appropriate off-campus venues.
Campus residence halls, apartments, and houses include students with a variety of perspectives on music and dance. These guidelines acknowledge and seek to honor these distinctions that enrich the campus community while at the same time clarifying communal expectations that are intended to encourage honoring and life-giving engagement in dancing on campus while avoiding the glorification as well as the objectification of the human body.
Out of respect for the wide range of individual experience, the campus community needs to be particularly careful in the selection of music, style of dance movement and dance attire, as well as the environment created for dance to occur. The Dean for Student Engagement is responsible for overseeing a careful process of approving and supervising campus social dance events that build community life.
Social Dance Guidelines:
Below are ways to clarify and extend freedom in the areas of social dancing, with attention being given to the appropriate selection of music content, dance style and dance attire:
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