PROFILE: H4 Community

ellachelseafoymediateam

1 month ago

H4 Community is a student-led non-profit focused on building creativity and confidence in young people through dance, serving students aged 15-18 throughout the Toronto Catholic District School Board. This summer, two Focus on Youth students were placed at H4 to bring hip hop dance to schools across the TCDSB, including St. Timothy and St. Nicholas. Splitting their time between remote and in-person, these visits extend a program built on the belief that dance can teach students what a typical classroom cannot.

At each school visit, founder Glendale Reyes opens by talking to students about putting themselves out there and stepping outside their comfort zone. He discusses how life, much like hip hop, can have difficult beats or rhythms to overcome, presenting the idea of how dance can teach students how to adapt and move in sync with whatever beat comes their way. With a slide presentation, Glen shows where H4 has been and who they’ve reached, providing students a look at how far the program has come since its founding.

After that, FOY students Ella and Ade take over, teaching simple hip hop moves designed to be accessible regardless of dance experience. Once the choreography is established, students split into groups and put together their own routines, mixing what they’d learned as well as their own ideas.

Each visit closes with a dance battle, where winners are decided by the audience’s response and awarded H4 shirts for their performance. More than a competition, H4 dance battles are a chance for students to step into a spotlight that many had never occupied before, fulfilling the ultimate goal of H4 of using dance as a tool to aid youth in discovering confidence.