Duration:
1 year (full-time)
Number of credits:
180
Start date(s):
September 2026
Expand, refine and articulate your unique vision of dance education.
We’ll empower you as a dance practitioner and educator to advance and innovate your teaching. You'll engage with current research, reflective practice, and practical, contextual and industry-based explorations, and graduate ready to lead and inspire within a range of contemporary dance education environments.
The programme integrates philosophy, practice as research, interdisciplinarity, and professional readiness, culminating in a final independent project focused on real-world application, a project that can go straight out in the industry.
Our graduates emerge as skilled dance educators, facilitators, and leaders with visionary skills to be change-makers for good. Through a dynamix mix of practical, contextual and industry-based learning, you'll expand your identity as a dance practitioner and prepare for a range of professional pathways - schools, businesses, community settings and professional dance contexts nationally and internationally.
We are committed to support individual dance practices and welcome students from a range of backgrounds and cultural perspectives. You will be encouraged to develop and test new ideas and skills in dance ‘laboratory’ situations critically to engage with the various cultural, social, and artistic contexts that shape pedagogy.
Dance, as a practice, is not merely about the physical embodiment of movement; it encapsulates a rich tapestry of history, identity, and expression that is influenced by a multitude of factors, including social and political contexts. Dance as an artform is community building, and you will consider this degree in an international and global context. Through informed and critical engagement with the current discourses in dance education and facilitation, our graduates explore holistic and inclusive approaches, with the potential to impact dance education in a wide range of contexts.
Modules
- Dance Practice
- Thinking Through Performance
- Approaching Performance
- Dance Pedagogy
- Creative Encounters
- Independent Practice and Performance Project
These modules are those we currently offer and may be subject to change.
Professional Experience Year
This course also offers the option of a Professional Experience Year. This programme combines dynamic career modules with flexible placement opportunities. After completing your first year of study, you'll then complete a full year of Professional Experience training as part of your degree. This will give you real career experience. This unique opportunity offers you distinct paths to build your expertise.
Career
Gain the practical, reflective and communication skills confidently to enter or advance within the arts industries.
The programme equips you with skills assessed through industry-based models, so you graduate prepared to enter the industry through multiple career pathways. Your final independent projects will be geared towards a product that can be applied straight to the industry, for example community workshops for vulnerable teenagers, a kathak practice for the elderly, a digital education and facilitation package for professional practitioners in choreography and curation, a dance on film series of workshops on climate change.
You can look forward to:
- Graduating with a portfolio comprising text, still and moving images, designed to effectively represent yourself to industry
- Industry guests run workshops on current professional projects inculcating working practice, language and social network
- Q&A sessions with industry guests that focus on key lessons for entering the industry
- The ability to locate and represent your specific practices, interests and skills within a cultural marketplace.
Your future could extend beyond performance roles. You’ll develop skills in communication, project management, and collaborative and feedback models, opening pathways into wider roles in the arts industry, from teaching and studio management, arts administration and producing to research and working in related arts fields.
Roehampton Dance staff have expertise in a vast variety of dance education and facilitation aspects from global and decolonial practices, choreographic and curatorial, community practice, screendance, etc, and through this, you will gain practical and theoretical knowledge, information and connections.
Staff enjoy strong relationships with a very wide range of international dance artists, companies, choreographers, producers, funders and more. They share their experiences of establishing such relationships through teaching, guest contributions, and wider industry opportunities like student access to workshops, festivals and performances.
Learning and assessment
How you'll learn
You’ll expand, advance and apply skills that will prepare you for professional life.
The programme is highly practical, and you’ll be learning in:
- Specialist studios
- Seminar rooms
- Digital labs
- Theatres and site-specific locations.
In the studio, you’ll develop advanced technical and creative skills through exploration, collaboration, and independent investigation. You’ll be encouraged to experiment, exchange ideas, and engage in flipped classroom approaches where your own practice and research inform group learning.
Learning takes place through a mix of digital and live formats, including performances, presentations, and digital portfolios. You’ll receive individual tutorials in every module, with tailored mentoring as part of your Independent Dance Education Project.
How you'll be assessed
Assessment on the MA Dance Education is designed to reflect real-world professional practice and support your development as an artist, educator, and researcher.
You’ll experience a range of inclusive, practice-based and written assessments that help you demonstrate creativity, critical thinking, and professional readiness. This includes:
- Practical demonstrations of embodied knowledge, performances, and facilitation tasks
- Digital and creative projects, including online content and portfolio work
- Written reflections, blogs, and critical essays connecting theory and practice
- Group projects and peer feedback models that develop collaborative and evaluative skills.
The programme is a collaborative dialogue between staff and your fellow students, and you’ll be invited collectively to discuss and re-write assessment criteria, and key roles are taken on by students to organise some practical assessments, such as planning workshop schedules, and curating the running order of teaching experiences.
Course staff
You will be taught by artists and researchers who are leading specialists in their fields and provide an excellent springboard for you to thrive in your career in dance and the arts.
Dr. Chi-Fang Chao
Dr. Chi-Fang Chao specialises in dance anthropology and dance ethnography. She has studied dance cultures in several Asian regions, such as Taiwan, Okinawa and the latter’s diaspora communities. Her major research interests include ritual, spirituality and embodiment, and indigenous dance theatre in the post-colonial era.
Dr. Nicola Conibere
Nicola Conibere is a choreographer and academic. Her research uses choreographic practices to explore the potentials of how bodyminds relate. She is interested in the politics of performance and the potentials of spectatorial exchange: her work often investigates theatricality, public appearing and social choreography.
Hanna Gillgren
Hanna Gillgren (SE) is choreographer and curator for H2DANCE and Fest en Fest an artist-run festival for expanded choreography for UK and Nordic-based choreographers. She is part of the inaugural artistic cohort at Rose Choreographic School Sadler’s Wells East London (2024-26).
Professor Sara Houston
Sara is an award winning researcher and teacher. She won the BUPA Foundation Prize in 2011 for her pioneering work in dance and Parkinson’s. In 2014 she was a Finalist in the National Public Engagement Awards for her work engaging the general public in her Parkinson’s and dance research.
Professor Alexandra Kolb
Alexandra has lectured at universities and conservatoires in the UK and internationally, following her Ph.D. from Cambridge University. She draws on a background in Literature, Art History and Philosophy alongside Dance and Theatre to convey to her students a sense of the dance field’s breadth and its many overlaps with other artistic and scholarly developments.
Lalitaraja
Lalitaraja (Joachim Chandler MA) is a dance artist, educator and Feldenkrais practitioner based in the dance department at Roehampton University where he teaches choreography, contact improvisation and improvisation. As a performer he has worked with Scottish Ballet, Michael Clark, Adventures in Motion Pictures, Laurie Booth, Yolande Snaith and Charles Linehan among others.
Dr. Heike Salzer
Heike Salzer is a German dancer and artist-scholar. She fluidly moves between performance, choreography, and site specific screendance. In 2014 she founded WECreate Productions together with Ana Baer Carrilllo (US/MX) jointly directing award winning screendances, installations and multi-media performances that have been encountered by thousands of audiences in Asia, Europe, Middle East and the Americas.
Dr. Tamara Tomić–Vajagić
Dr. Tamara Tomić–Vajagić works across visual culture, digital media, and performance and is a Senior Lecturer in Dance Practices. She teaches across undergraduate and postgraduate degrees as well as researches and supervises doctoral projects on the themes of dance and visual art, mediated choreography, and dance history, aesthetics, and performance studies.
Mike Toon
Michael Toon trained at the Legat School and Urdang Academy before performing with London City Ballet, Vienna Festival Ballet and as an international freelance soloist. Alongside his stage career he co-founded Capitol Chamber Ballet Project and Heart of the Jester Productions, creating opportunities for collaboration between dancers, musicians and technicians.
Dance spaces and studios
Large state-of-the-art, purpose-built dance and teaching spaces, designed for dance classes, workshops and movement exploration. Equipped with highly-sprung harlequin floors and underfloor heating.
A dedicated, well-equipped dance studio, perfect for practical dance classes and rehearsals. Equipped with highly-sprung harlequin floors, and a large TV for presentations.
Modern and accessible teaching space supporting dance theory, workshops and rehearsals.
Multipurpose hall, used for workshops, rehearsals and choreographic sharing.
Large and historic (18th-century) room used for teaching, special events and occasional performances.
Professionally rigged 350-seat theatre providing a first-rate performance venue for showcases and productions. Equipped with highly-sprung harlequin floors. Used for teaching, rehearsals and performance.
High-quality dance studio equipped with technology for rehearsals, choreography development, installations, and interdisciplinary creative practice. Equipped with highly-sprung harlequin floors and lighting rig.
Computer labs with extensive software for audio-visual editing of film and sound, and a 95-seat cinema.
Open days
Get a real taste of our campus, community and what it’s like to study at Roehampton
Applying
Full-time UK postgraduate students apply through our direct application system.
Course subject to curriculum review and validation.
Specific entry requirements
UK 2:2 or above, or equivalent
Applicants are required to provide a link to a short video (10 minutes maximum) of them dancing. This can be in a studio or theatre setting as long as the applicant is clearly identified in the video. The work should be accompanied by a short written statement which reveals the applicant’s interest in expanding, advancing or innovating their dance education and teaching practice.
General entry requirements
September 2026 entry tuition fees (UK)
| Level of study | Full-time |
| MA | TBC |
We offer a wide range of scholarships and bursaries. See our financial support pages for UK students.
We also provide other ways to support the cost of living, including on-campus car parking, hardship support and some of the most affordable student accommodation and catering in London. Find out more about how we can support you.
International undergraduate students apply through our direct application system.
Course subject to curriculum review and validation.
Specific entry requirements
UK 2:2 or above, or equivalent
Applicants are required to provide a link to a short video (10 minutes maximum) of them dancing. This can be in a studio or theatre setting as long as the applicant is clearly identified in the video. The work should be accompanied by a short written statement which reveals the applicant’s interest in expanding, advancing or innovating their dance education and teaching practice.
General entry requirements
September 2026 entry tuition fees (international)
| Level of study | Full-time |
| MA | TBC |
We offer a wide range of scholarships and bursaries. See our financial support pages for international students.
We also provide other ways to support the cost of living, including on-campus car parking, hardship support and some of the most affordable student accommodation and catering in London. Find out more about how we can support you.
Need help or advice before applying?
Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences
Integrating the creative dynamism of arts and digital industries with the deep-rooted traditions of humanities and social sciences.
