amrinder13
Member
- Messages
- 63
Hi all - hope everyone is having a great start to 2019!
As a preface, we don’t typically publish any critiques or get involved in the “behind the scenes” operations of the circuit, but we had such an unpleasant experience at our most recent competition that we felt strongly enough to put this together. Even though we only took the time to write about the items that we thought warranted feedback, most other things were on point!
This is solely from the perspective of the DCMPAA coaching staff and is from the expectations of a Bhangra competition only! (It was a fusion competition – 8 Raas/8 Bhangra)
In no specific order:
Post Registration asks were over the top/abnormal late fees
This was a fusion competition. 8 Raas/8 Bhangra teams. Again, no problem at all – we knew what we were signing up for. However, after speaking with some committee members, we found out that the two directors of the show only had a Raas background and are running the competition from prior experience in the Raas circuit. On a go forward basis, it would make sense to have one director with a Raas background to channel the Raas expectation and another with a Bhangra background to channel the Bhangra expectation. Again, this is our best guess as we don’t know otherwise.
As mentioned, we don’t expect anything from this post. The judges rewarded us first place – this post is not out of bad spite. We wanted to express our experience as competitions are ultimately the lifeblood of the circuit. If teams had no place to compete or showcase our talent, the circuit would not be where it is today. Competitions have a HUGE impact on every team in many ways. We hope this helps the general improvement of competitions not only to enhance teams experiences but for the greater good of the Bhangra community!
Lastly – we want to give a BIG BIG shoutout to our liasons Azman Garcha & Gurdeep Singh. Even throughout the midst of all the frustration, these guys were able to keep our heads above water! Thank you mitro.
Collectively,
DCMPAA Coaching Staff
Feel free to private message us on any media platform for any follow up/questions/feedback. Thank you!
As a preface, we don’t typically publish any critiques or get involved in the “behind the scenes” operations of the circuit, but we had such an unpleasant experience at our most recent competition that we felt strongly enough to put this together. Even though we only took the time to write about the items that we thought warranted feedback, most other things were on point!
This is solely from the perspective of the DCMPAA coaching staff and is from the expectations of a Bhangra competition only! (It was a fusion competition – 8 Raas/8 Bhangra)
In no specific order:
Post Registration asks were over the top/abnormal late fees
- Ex. - 3 pictures of each dancer (mix of dancing and street clothes) were required to be submitted for “Decoration & Hospitality” purposes. We completely understand wanting to make all teams feel welcomed and appreciated, but it isn’t necessary to charge a $20 late fee each day we don’t have 36 pictures collected.
- We repeatedly informed the committee that we wouldn’t be offended or upset if we missed out on a warm welcome or decorations as it’s our own fault, but the committee insisted.
- Ex. - We submitted a roster during initial registration but by the time of the competition we had switched out a couple of dancers due to injuries and family events. When we asked the committee to switch out the dancers, there was a $10 fee for each name that had to be switched out on the roster.
- All tickets were purchased via a google excel sheet and payment made to ECS via Venmo. That was the only way you could purchase tickets.
- Total capacity was ~300-350 (can’t remember exact number).
- There were a total of 16 teams
- If you conservatively average 10 members a team, that’s 160 dancers alone (more than half capacity)
- Even if dancers had to stay backstage…the math doesn’t add up
- The sound system was one speaker on each side of the stage. The audience could barely hear the music let alone the dancers.
- We were initially deducted 2 points without knowledge or warning before we had even performed. The reasoning was because we were disrespectful during tech time when talking about the poor-quality sound and also due to the fact that the production employee’s manager had apparently complained about our rudeness after tech time. When asked to talk to the manager and confront the situation, we were denied.
- We had a pleasant conversation with production employee and the interaction was nothing out of the ordinary.
- After 20 minutes of back and forth 15 minutes before showtime, we were rewarded our 2 points back.
- The production manager needed time to cue the track/adjust the sound (longer than usual, lasted roughly 2 minutes). Not a big deal at all, but the tech time clock (a timer displayed on a laptop that was sitting on the stage) kept winding down and nobody was keeping track of the wasted time. Naturally, one of our team members went to press “pause” on the timer as there was no committee member in the area.
- Not a problem until the committee informed us that this was another thing that contributed to the above point deduction.
- In the end, we were rewarded an arbitrary 1:30 extra minutes
- It came to our attention that one of the judges on the panel had a current affiliation and has a history not only with a competing team, but a personal relationship with the judging chair of the competition committee. The judging chair did admit they knew about the affiliation but told us they had come up with an algorithm to insure the scoring would not be bias. After asking what the algorithm was, she explained it as simply eliminating the outliers of any particular judge.
This was a fusion competition. 8 Raas/8 Bhangra teams. Again, no problem at all – we knew what we were signing up for. However, after speaking with some committee members, we found out that the two directors of the show only had a Raas background and are running the competition from prior experience in the Raas circuit. On a go forward basis, it would make sense to have one director with a Raas background to channel the Raas expectation and another with a Bhangra background to channel the Bhangra expectation. Again, this is our best guess as we don’t know otherwise.
As mentioned, we don’t expect anything from this post. The judges rewarded us first place – this post is not out of bad spite. We wanted to express our experience as competitions are ultimately the lifeblood of the circuit. If teams had no place to compete or showcase our talent, the circuit would not be where it is today. Competitions have a HUGE impact on every team in many ways. We hope this helps the general improvement of competitions not only to enhance teams experiences but for the greater good of the Bhangra community!
Lastly – we want to give a BIG BIG shoutout to our liasons Azman Garcha & Gurdeep Singh. Even throughout the midst of all the frustration, these guys were able to keep our heads above water! Thank you mitro.
Collectively,
DCMPAA Coaching Staff
Feel free to private message us on any media platform for any follow up/questions/feedback. Thank you!