I am not sure where "fedup" has received her information but as a member of the MIT Ballroom Dance Team Executive Committee, I would like to clarify a few things.
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The most recent event was a competition featuring Bryan and Carmen as guests. This owner bought up all the tickets from the captain of his own coaching team and marked them up 400%.
The MIT Ballroom Dance Team had offered two tiers of ticketing for the show with Bryan Watson and Carmen during the MIT 2004 Competition: general admission tickets ($5-$10), and so-called "VIP" or "Front Row" tickets which we were offering to the general public at the price of $50. Although the general admission tickets were available only through MITBDT, the more costly tickets were also offered to ANY studio for purchase at a minor discount as an incentive for them to be bought in bulk to help raise money to fund our competition. The coach in question had done just that, without marking up the price beyond what we would have sold them for in the first place.
Information regarding the VIP tickets and offers of bulk sales to studios had previously been available for public viewing online on our website at mitbdt.mit.edu.
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There is hardly a college venue that he does not impact negatively, usually involving money.
This comment seems to be at odds with our experience at MIT. All of our coaches are paid the same amount of money for one hour lessons. This particular coach routinely teaches for one and a half hours or sometimes even two without further reimbursement. His interest in MITBDT also does not seem to be financially motivated, as on many occasions, he had been completely unaware of missed payments by the team.
The involvement of this teacher on the collegiate scene includes coaching of the MIT Ballroom Dance Team and giving private lessons to some collegiate couples who volitionally choose to take lessons from him (and at a significant discount from his regular coaching fees). He is also invited to judge at some collegiate competitions. As is the case with every other judge, he does so for free or for a nominal stipend.
None of this supports the notion by "fedup" quoted above.
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He is unfortunately (especially since he was never a well-trained dancer himslef) the coach of a local university team.
This statement by "fedup" is subjective and once again is not consistent with the experiences of the MIT Ballroom Dance Team. MITBDT has secured this coach for several years and has been extremely pleased with him. At the end of every term, the team (composed of upwards of 60 dancers) polls its members on its coaches and this coach has received uniformly positive reviews. As a testament to his competency, the team has consistently placed couples in the finals (top 6) of collegiate comps (team results of finalsts are archived at
http://mitbdt.mit.edu/DanceFloor/discuss.pl?id=143). This is not a small achievement, as most collegiate competitions host extremely large fields of dancers. Most single events at collegiate comps have a field of over 20 couples. In the case of Harvard Beginner's 2003, there were over 170.
