Swing Dance Survey Results

The Austin Swing Syndicate continues to keep a strong watch on when we can safely reopen for dancing and what the transitions of reopening may look like, while matching public health concerns with readiness to return for the majority of our dancers in a financially responsible way. 

Thank you everyone (124 of you!) who completed our survey. These results will help Austin Swing Syndicate leadership shape events and classes for our dance community. 

The majority of people answering the survey (55%) reported that they attended weekly classes and dances at The Fed. We’re excited to have such strong engagement from our regular community and to still have a good response from dancers who attend less frequently (28% once a month or every 2-3 months) so we could ascertain their willingness to return to dancing too. 

Most people (81%) have not been participating in virtual online dance classes. Survey results showed that generally people are not interested in returning to The Fed for in-person solo dance classes but would rather wait until partner dance of some kind resumes. 

Dancers are split in roughly equal amounts on each end of the spectrum when it comes to returning to dancing and safety procedures: half our dancers are comfortable dancing with masks and not rotating partners and half of them are not at this time. More years of dance experience and age each correlated to being less comfortable returning to dancing right now. 

This survey represents a snapshot from mid-August of our community’s readiness to return to dancing when safe. As we all know, the ability to reopen changes with infection rates, hospitalization rates, holiday impacts, and following public health regulations about capacity with consideration of the unique aspects of partner dancing. 

We will be sending out another survey to assess our community’s readiness again in the future and welcome your comments at that time or you can send us a private message. 

We continue to look forward to the day when we can safely reopen the doors of The Fed for dancers within public health regulations and when it is financially stable to have enough dancers ready to return to support the reopening.