Central School of Ballet's design for dance: a model program within a London ballet conservatory.

"Half of choreography is just setting on with it," muses Sara Matthews, assistant director of London's Central School of Ballet. "It's not what you're taught, but what you do with it." At CSB, a three-year degree program for students ages 16 to 19 founded in 1982 by former Royal Ballet principal dancer Christopher Gable, choreography is required of all students. They make solos during their first year and group works in their second.

Matthews, who danced with Rambert Dance Company, designed and, with input from guest teachers, curates the unique study module that has helped launch the choreography careers of CSB graduates. Morgann Runacre-Temple, for example, is a 2005 apprentice with choreographer Cathy Marston (a 2004 DM "25 to Watch") at the Linbury Theatre of the Royal Opera House and her works are in the repertoire of European Ballet and Ballet Ireland. Michael Keegan Dolan founded Ireland's Fabulous Beast Theatre and his Giselle was featured in the prestigious Barbican International Theatre Event season (BITE:05).

In workshop, Matthews encourages dancers to explore, focusing on ways to put movement together that stretch their concept of ballet. "They'll choose a ballet phrase, then take it apart, or approach it as a contemporary phrase," she explains. Students then develop a project by first selecting a poem, an image of a statue, or a piece of music as inspiration. During the summer before their second year, they write an outline of how they will use their stimulus object. Matthews says, "Some come back incredibly well-organized--with scrapbooks, and painted images to work from--a very successful, though not prescriptive, working document."

The students also find their own music from a range that includes Baroque (1680-1730), French (1900-1930), European late romantic, South American classical, non-European traditional percussion-based, and North American (1965-1985), and that pointedly excludes contemporary pop music. "We used to let them use whatever music they wanted, but they kept choosing pop or film scores," says Matthews. "Now, we discourage them from using what's easy and available."

In tutorials students and faculty advisors talk through ideas and suggestions. "We pare the ideas down to one, and ask, 'What's the mood? How will the audience feel watching the piece?' " explains Matthews. Students then have half an hour to create a sample segment of their piece, and the advisers select five pieces to rehearse. From selection to showing, students have three months to prepare.

A vital element of the project is collaboration with design students from London's highly regarded Central St. Martin's School of Design. After watching rehearsals, the designers pair up with choreographers and return with set and costume concepts. The teams then work with a professional lighting technician, set carpenter, and wardrobe mistress.

As the deadline approaches, they begin a 10-day intensive period with three-hour daily rehearsals, and an adviser is assigned to tutor each piece. After the showing at a London theater, the selection process is repeated so that by the end of the second year, every student has had a go.

What are the biggest obstacles? According to Matthews, "Falling back on cliches, and failing to fully use space." One of the choreographic advisers, teacher Antonio Castilla, adds, "Difficulty getting what they want from the dancers."

"They're not experienced as teachers or in communicating on a professional level with peers," says Castilla who was principal dancer, then teacher, with the San Francisco Ballet, before joining CSB. "We help them use different approaches to identify what they want. We might ask, 'Have you had the dancer exaggerate, or reverse the direction?' We are mentors who cannot, and don't, impose our own ideas. We give guidelines, such as 'It should have that many dancers, be this lone,' so the choreographers don't drive themselves crazy."

Students who show flair for choreography can do more. The creative experience of making work, leading and managing dancers, and gaining an appreciation of the selection process is a big achievement--not to mention learning to collaborate with artists in music and design.

"Dance can be about doing what you're told, and this isn't!" Matthews emphasizes. "It's so important to give students bound for the world of dance something to manage themselves."