Freshman dance major Reba Bartram recently returned from Kansas, where her track and field relay team competed in a national championship and broke the school’s record. Bartram considers it one of her proudest moments in track at
Point Park.

“I just think that being able, as a freshman, to go to nationals for track was really awesome and a really great experience, especially with the people that I went with because we had some seniors, some juniors, we had all across the board. And a few other freshman made it which was really cool to experience,” Bartram said.

In addition to participating in the track team, Bartram is also a dance major and is a part of Dance Club and IMPULSE.

Bartram has been dancing ever since she was three years old, and originally started in jazz and hip hop before switching her focus to ballet.

“Well I still do all of it, I just like to focus on ballet which is one of the strongest things that makes you the strongest for dance. But I also just love jazz and I love taking it here,” Bartram said.

Bartram said she had been used to balancing dance with track for a long time.

“I mean I’ve been doing it since I was a kid, I mean I’ve always been running and dancing since I was younger, and it’s definitely hard. Everybody always asks me like ‘How do you do it?’ But, I mean I just do it because I enjoy doing them both and being a part of both programs here is a great experience I think,” Bartram said.

Bartram’s busy schedule occasionally conflicts, and sometimes results in her missing class for meets, or missing practice for class.

“I just make it work, but with the support of both my track coach and my dance teachers it works, and everyone helps me out with that,” Bartram said.

There are some days when Bartram says the physical demands of both activities becomes difficult, although she also stated that track and dance are complementary to each other.

“There’s days where I am sore for like a whole week,” Bartram said. “But I think that they both kind of balance each other very well because my stamina in dance is great and then my strength and core is great for running. So they work really well together.”

In the future, Bartram hopes to join a broadway show or company before going to Los Angeles for commercial work.

“I kind of want to dip my feet into everything,” Bartram said.