Roma’s Edrine Keegan receives international Community Engagement Dance Teacher Award

A Roma ballet teacher who has run a charity concert every year since 1983 has been recognised for her passion and dedication to dance.

An 81-year-old Roma ballet teacher has been recognised for more than 60 years of charity work at the annual international Royal Academy of Dance Awards.

Owner of Edrine Keegan School of Ballet, Ms Keegant has raised more than $100,000 for community groups through her annual charity concert as well as sponsoring dance scholarship for regional students received the Community Engagement Dance Teacher Award last week.

The award acknowledges a teacher’s “exceptional contribution in using dance as a tool for social interaction, empowerment and positive change within the community.”

Dancers from the Edrine Keegan School of Ballet will take to the stage tonight, for their annual charity concert in aid of the Roma Lions Drought Relief Fund.

Ms Keegan said it was an honour to receive the award after a lifetime dedicated to dance.

“I’ve been a member of the academy since 1963 so it was nice to be awarded that,” she said.

“Apart from teaching I run a charity concert every year, the first one I did was in 1965 and I raised a grand and five pound for blue nurses which in 1965 was a lot of money.

“I went to Sydney finished by training down there, came back had six kids and started full time teaching in 1983 and I’ve ran a concert every year since plus others in the middle for different things like a student who had cancer and another guy who needed a heart transplant.

“Over the years every fete we would dance for them to help them raise money, in the old days when the hospital had fetes we danced there so I’ve sort of being involved in the community for forever and a day.

Maranoa Regional Council Mayor Wendy Taylor and Edrine Keegan. Photo supplied.

Ms Keegan said even after all the years dancing and teaching her passion remained as strong as ever.

“When I first started out here there were no other teachers, there was a travelling teacher who came in once a month but my school being here gives these country kids something the city kids take for granted,” she said.

“You’ve got ballet academies all over Brisbane, but when I first stated there was nothing between Toowoomba and Roma and Roma and Mt Isa, It’s about keeping dance alive in the West.

“Ballet has been my passion since I was 10 years old and I’m 81 now, what I love about it is it is static to a point in that you have basic techniques but It keeps moving and evolving, I love the fact that they come up with new items and new forms of teaching.

“I feel dance is a gift I must pass on and I just love it as well, I love the people, love the town and love the children.”

After decades of dance Ms Keegan thinks back to her first teachers and hopes they would be proud of all she’s achieved.

“My very first ballet teachers actually came from Roma and in time I brought it back to Roma for them, they never came back but because of them I am out here teaching,” she said.

“I’ve got a picture of them on the wall and I talk to them and say ‘I hope you enjoyed that dance’, it is a pretty special thing.”

Originally published as Roma’s Edrine Keegan receives international Community Engagement Dance Teacher Award