Spotlight Blog: Professional Graduate Programme

Leap into your dance career with the Academy of Northern Ballet’s Professional Graduate Programme!

Are you an aspiring dancer aged 18–20, eager to transition from vocational training but not quite ready for a career as a professional dancer? The Academy of Northern Ballet’s Professional Graduate Programme offers a unique, one-year traineeship in the UK, designed to bridge that gap and propel you into the world of professional dance.

What is the Professional Graduate Programme?

This full-time, post-vocational, professional ballet trainee programme takes place at Northern Ballet’s award-winning headquarters in central Leeds. Home to seven full size studios with excellent facilities, and the opportunity to train and potentially perform alongside Company dancers.

Led by world-class teaching staff with an abundance of professional experience, our graduate ballet programme offers bespoke coaching and mentoring, preparing you for a career in a professional dance company.

The Academy of Northern Ballet believes that a pre-professional ballet training prior to professional career can enhance a dancer’s knowledge, technique, resilience and give experience of life as a Company dancer.  

From classical and contemporary dance classes to potential performance experience while touring alongside Company dancers in our children's ballets and full-length narrative ballets — this pre-professional course bridges the gap from vocational dance to a professional pathway and offers a unique opportunity to dancers that are often inaccessible before a full-time career. 

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