'It opens you up,' Boston Ballet brings dance lessons to city schools

ROXBURY - A partnership between the Boston Ballet and city schools is offering a free dance program for students.

Third graders get to learn ballet and a love of dance.

"Art allows you to be yourself and it opens you up, it opens you up in a way that regular academics couldn't," dance teacher Jason Jordan told WBZ-TV.

"It's incredible for lack of a better term. It's inspiring to be able to see that moment and be in the room with them when their eyes light up and they say 'Oh I didn't realize this was something that I could do,'" said Jesse Garlic of the Boston Ballet.

And we sure saw that moment when we visited the class at Orchard Gardens K-8 School Thursday.

A special guest was able to surprise the students - Isaac Akiba of the Boston Ballet.

"It's incredibly important to introduce kids to dance because it teaches you so many life lessons. I think the biggest one for me was discipline. What does it really mean to work hard," he told WBZ.

And work hard he did. Because Isaac was once a third grader in the city dance program and that's where he found his love for dance. He's now a soloist in the Boston Ballet company.

"It's so special. It feels like an opportunity to learn something new and different that you wouldn't normally get as an inner-city kid," Akiba said.

It's an opportunity 3,000 children a year for the last 30 years have gotten to experience.

"What I hope for each of them is that they go home and they say 'I danced today. T his is something that I discovered, something that I like to do," Garlic told WBZ.

They know not every child will become a professional dancer like Isaac but they hope the program instills a sense of empowerment and love for art.