Copyright bbc
Joe and Barnaby both receive funding to help them train because Northern Ballet and NSCD are National Centres for Advanced Training in Dance (CAT). The schools offer a training programme to the next generation of aspiring dancers aged between 11 and 18 which is funded by the Department for Education (DfE). Until it was cut earlier this year, the CAT programme also had an outreach arm that funded dance schools to go into communities and mainstream schools to find potential dancers. Students and teachers fear the CAT scheme could be cut altogether after they were told that ministers could only promise funding until the end of this academic year. According to its organisers, across its 10 regional centres, the CAT scheme reaches about 900 students. About 68% of those receive means-tested bursaries and 52% come from households earning less than £25,000. Ms Witney, who as well as teaching Joe is also chair of the National Dance CAT managers group, says: "Joe's training was supported by DfE grants, so Joe's career trajectory has been supported by that financial income. "Without those grants, we won't have the Joes." The DfE says it is committed to "breaking down barriers to opportunity so every child can achieve and thrive". A spokesperson for the department said it was providing £36.5m across the music and dance CAT schemes this academic year. "We are creating those dancers of the future, it's just we need that support and that backing to keep it going," says Ms Witney. "It might be 25 years of Billy Elliot, but actually some things still haven't changed - or they did, and then they've come back around again."
