Dancers go all out for Red Hot Ballroom Competition

Proud parents ringed the dance floor at the Brownsville Events Center on Wednesday, where months of preparation are coming to fruition for hundreds of BISD dancers in the annual Red Hot Ballroom Competition.

The preliminaries were Wednesday for elementary students and will be today in the secondary division. In all, 43 schools are participating. The finals in both divisions are tonight at 7.

The event started four years ago as a way to add dancing to the Brownsville Independent School District’s elementary curriculum. It has since morphed into a wildly popular competition that takes its cue from ABC TV’s “Dancing with the Stars.”

Late Wednesday morning Brian Collentine watched with some amazement as his daughter, Mackenzie Collentine, a fifth-grader at Yturria Elementary, danced the cha-cha with Eric Garza and Collentine’s wife, Susan, made a video of the performance.

“She’s the tall blonde,” Collentine said of his daughter. “This is the first time I’ve actually seen her dance for myself.”

Susan Collentine said Mackenzie has been practicing from 3:30 to 5 p.m. two to three times a week since school started in August. She’s improved “from knowing nothing to this,” she said, referring to the couple’s performance.

Across the room, Esmeralda Esparza said her daughter, Alexa Fhernanda Leal, a fifth-grader at Ortiz Elementary, had been involved in a similar training regimen.

“Since August she’s been practicing every day,” Esparza said. “When she grows up she wants to be on ‘Dancing with the Stars.’ I’m a single mother, so I took the day off from work because it’s very important for her for me to be here. ... It just felt so beautiful to see her dancing.”

At the elementary level, only fifth-graders compete. Each school has three couples per dance and there are seven dances — waltz, tango, fox trot, rumba, cha-cha, meringue and swing — for 21 couples. The numbers don’t quite add up since there’s always a shortage of boys and each boy usually dances with several partners.

“It all depends on their ability. Some have natural talent and some of them you have to work with,” said Isabel Salinas, a librarian at Pullam Elementary and a volunteer dance coach.

At the middle-school level, the students dance salsa instead of merengue, and high school students do mambo for their Latin dance.

Karen Ruiz, a behavior intervention teacher at the school who also volunteers as dance coach, said the shortage of boys is districtwide.

“We even had T-shirts printed,” she said. “‘Eat, Sleep and Breathe Ballroom Dancing.’ We’re hoping to advance to the finals.”