As twelve girls flex their feet, Anastasia Hathaway, eighth grade student, stretches her way towards a future career in ballet. Hathaway has been practicing ballet for the past eleven years. The motivation behind her drive to excel began when her grandmother took her to her first ballet, Swan Lake, at the age of two. Although this seems like a young age the performance was enough to instill in her at that young age the inspiration to succeed in the area of performing arts.
“Seeing Swan Lake motivated me to do ballet, and after that my mother enrolled me for classes,” said Hathaway.
She takes lessons at the St. Louis Ballet School in Chesterfield Valley and takes pointe and ballet classes. She practices almost every day after school for a total of ten hours. This poses
“The practices are usually intense yet fun. I do have to sacrifice some things because of dance. I usually am not able to go to birthday parties that are on Saturday since my practice is in the afternoon,” said Hathaway.
But this does not deter her from her continuing passion. Hathaway is careful at being a dedicated student and dancer. Since she is hardly at home on a school nights she has become very diligent and conscientious to complete her homework while she is out. A typical day involves her arriving at school, and immediately afterwards heading to her dance studio. Since her two younger sisters are also involved with dance so she is at the studio from four to nine-thirty every evening.
“I try to finish my work in class which causes me to have to drive to work diligently. If I don’t finish my homework then I will just do it while I am waiting for my dance class.”
This can involve her doing her homework in the car on the way to the studio, in various restaurants like Bread Company, and even in the waiting room at her dance studio.
Although dance is a strong passion for Hathaway she still tries out other sports and attempts to be as active as she can for school related events. In the fall she was on the volleyball team and enjoyed the different environment that it produced.
When she gets older her ambition is to become a professional dancer as well as a dance instructor.
“I love younger kids and that would be an ideal job for when I became older and had to look for a profession,” said Hathaway.
All of her hard work at dancing is really starting to pay off, and this is evident in her latest accomplishment. She has been cast as the leading role of Clara in The Nutcracker, which is being performed at the University of Missouri-Saint Louis on December 17th through the 21st. Seven girls tried out for the part however Hathaway’s talent gained her the role.
A tricky feat that she is having to master is changing costumes in between dance scenes.
“We only have a minute to change into our costumes. I am having to get out of a huge dress into a nightgown.”
Ballet has impacted Hathaway because it has instilled diligence and patience into her daily life.
“Ballet is fun because when you are sore the day after you know that you have done something great that will help you improve in dancing.”