From Precision Step:

During the month of March, the Precision Step Team has been everywhere on the Lafayette map. The Precision Step Team has participated in a plethora of events because we want our campus to know about our organization.

For beginners, the week-long Extravaganza sponsored by ISA (International Student Association) was held from March 19-24, 2012 and Precision was just one of its many clubs and organizations that participated. All the brown-bags, discussions and guests appearances culminated to the Grand Finale on March 24, 2012. During the Finale, Precision was scheduled to perform last and that intensified the jitters. Nonetheless, there have been countless practices and numerous questions, clarifications and repetitions on all the moves so we were confident that each member knew their stuff. The acts leading up to our performance were all very cultural and illustrated how varied our campus really is. Finally, Precision performed at the end and we yelled and stomped our hearts out. During this performance, we yelled one of our Precision chants while stepping and we also yelled the Alma Mater of Lafayette while executing another step. The theme that Precision tried to illustrate during this performance was a traditional weekend Lafayette scene, which is usually a night in Campus Pizza. However, we switched it up by becoming serious and more intense because that’s how stepping is usually performed. On the other hand, we ended the serious performance with the party scene again just to bring it home. Additionally, this performance was one of the longest so by the time we finished we were drenched in sweat. However tiring the entire performance was, we knew that it would help immensely to raise school spirit. Albeit a long performance, it was still a gratifying and awesome experience.

Additionally, the Precision Step Team attended and performed at the reception event for the Spirit of Uganda organization on March 20th, 2012. This organization that is sponsored by the Empowering African Children organization has young children and young adults from Uganda perform traditional dance and songs from their homes. In addition, the children and teenagers go on tour for about four months doing these dances and songs and then are returned home. The reason why most children join is because the Empowering African Children organization allows them to apply to scholarships that will help them to attend schools and universities.

Gaining this background on the Spirit of Uganda, Precision thought it would be appropriate to showcase the Gumboot dance that also originates from Africa, but from South Africa to be more specific. The Gumboot dance is actually an old form of communication for gold miners in South Africa because they were not allowed to speak to each other and they were mining very far apart so slapping their boots or stomping their feet became their way of conversing.

Before Precision’s performance, we got a chance to sit and meet the Ugandan students individually and they are some very impressive and well-mannered students. Also, they spoke very good English with a beautiful accent. During our performance, there were some jitters because we were so close to the audience and technically did not have a stage. Nonetheless, we did a great job. Then, the Spirit of Uganda presented a small preview of what the Lafayette campus would experience the next day. They did a song with interesting musical instruments and with great vocals. Afterwards, the students were so impressed with stepping that they ran up and asked to learn various step routines. Some of the students learned our routines so quickly that they could be a part of Precision! It was a great evening overall.

Furthermore, for the Black History Month Finale event on March 2, 2012 sponsored by the Association of Black Collegians, the Precision Step Team in collaboration with the Lehigh University step team, LU’s Finest, performed a step routine to illustrate the Gumboot dance.  Multiple practices with LU’s Finest helped to have a great performance. During the performance, there was a huge audience of Lafayette students, Easton residents, faculty, and staff. Additionally, there were several orators and dance teams. Overall, every performance before ours excited the crowd a lot so that by the time Precision and LU’s Finest performed, the enthusiasm was at its peak. It was a grand success.

 

Moreover, the Precision Step Team performed at the TedxLAF on Saturday, March 3rd. It was a bit hectic since it was the day after the Black History Month Finale. Nonetheless, Precision members were prepared and met in a timely fashion in order to practice. Then, we attend the TedxLAF event that was geared towards Global Citizenship. The event was interestingly named “Re-Finding We”, which hints to a retreat that occurred early in the fall semester named “Finding We”. It was a pretty long event that showcased a variety of topics, for example, there was a presentation on the Consciousness of Music and then there was an international video chat with one of the guest presenters.

What Precision did to fit in with the Global Citizenship topic was by having each and every member memorize and recite a line that defined global citizenship to them. The significance of this part of our performance was to take a pause from our stomping and clapping and portray every individual to the audience instead a team. In other words, by individually defining global citizenship, Precision as a team took the back seat so that the audience got to know us as individuals with respective opinions. However, immediately afterwards, we united and did what we do best, step. Overall, it was a great performance where people who probably would not have gotten a taste of stepping and what this were in attendance.