Avery Ambrefe

“I gave myself a year,” shares Avery Ambrefe (BAAS ’27—expected) about her decision to forgo the traditional college path to pursue a career as a dancer. She was an excellent student, taking AP courses and serving as student body president every year at her Catholic prep school outside of Boston. She was also an experienced competitive dancer, training in the studio five to six times a week. As her 2018 graduation approached, she made her choice. “At the end of the day, I looked at the college offers and nothing felt as right as moving to New York to start dancing,” she says. Through dedication and perseverance, she succeeded in launching her career, even landing her dream job dancing with the Radio City Rockettes. When she decided it was time to reconsider college, the Penn LPS Online Bachelor of Applied Arts and Sciences (BAAS) program allowed Avery to balance her demanding profession with studying part-time to earn her degree.

That first year in New York City, Avery recalls, put her through her paces—the auditions, the rejections, the survival jobs. “I'd gotten lots of callbacks, but in 11 months I hadn't been able to book anything,” she shares. By July 2019 she was almost burnt out and out of time. With just one month and one printed headshot-resume left, she finally booked a professional gig. “It was very humble beginnings dancing at a theme park,” she says, “but that is what kickstarted my professional dance career.”

Not long after, however, live performances came to a halt. “I was finally getting my footing and gaining some momentum and then everything kind of crashed down,” she says. “So, during the pandemic, I started having some conversations with my mom about making a transition back to my more academic side and begin working towards my degree, finally.”

Avery knew about several online college programs through other dancers, including Penn LPS Online. “I had always been interested in attending an Ivy League school,” she says. Checking out the curriculum, Avery was attracted to the leadership and positive psychology courses the Penn program offered. “And the virtual option allowed me to have access to a high-level education during the pandemic,” she adds. Avery was thinking long-term, too. “In the future, when performances did resume, I would be able to continue with the program and earn a degree.”

Avery took her first class, Leadership, Theory, Practice, and Purpose, in January 2021 and loved it. A few months later, she earned a Penn LPS Online scholarship, which has helped her continue on her degree path. She’s about halfway through her degree now, leaning toward completing a concentration in Leadership and Communication and a Certificate in Applied Positive Psychology.

Although it can be a challenge, Avery enjoys her work-school balance. “As a dancer, your schedule might start with a fitness class in the morning, and then you might have 30 minutes or an hour free, then a dance class, then a two-hour break before an audition. If you get a call back for the audition, maybe they say come back in three hours,” she describes.

To fit school in, Avery leans into the discipline she developed as a young student-dancer. “I'm living my double life,” she smiles. “I have these little glasses I put on when I do schoolwork; It's almost like a costume for me. I really embrace that academic persona.” When one course required weekly podcast listening, Avery put her headphones on during her subway commute to ballet and took notes on her phone. And when she can, she finds a quiet place for schoolwork. “I love to go to the New York Public Library and study in the Rose Main Reading Room,” she says. “Thirty minutes after that, I could be throwing my hair up into a ponytail, putting on a spandex unitard and running off to dance class.”

To keep up with her career, Avery tends to take one course a term, with some breaks from classes when her bookings require it. “Something I really appreciate about the program is the accelerated eight-week terms because my life can be highly unpredictable,” she says. “Budgeting out eight weeks for a course feels very achievable.”

That built-in flexibility—and the support she gets from the program team—has been essential for Avery, especially when it came to chasing her ultimate dream. “Growing up,” she reflects, “I was lucky to spend a lot of my summers training here in New York City, including some training with Rockettes, which is where a small dream was planted in my heart to move to New York and dance at Radio City someday.” Last year, that dream came true.

The audition process to join the world-famous precision dance troupe—and perform in the Christmas Spectacular—begins in April each year with an open call. “Up to a thousand women line up outside our marquee for a chance to be seen by the director,” Avery explains. In spring 2024, Avery was one of the lucky dancers from the open call to earn an invitation to Rockettes Conservatory—one of the company’s no-fee dancer development programs. Each summer, dancers from across the country are invited to take part in the week-long intensive training program where they learn choreography from current Rockettes before a final audition in August.

“I was enrolled in an LPS course while Conservatory was happening, which, you can imagine, was quite rigorous,” she says. “The course professor was very willing to work with me so I could complete some assignments early, before Conservatory week, so that could be my primary focus,” she says. “I feel like it's not to be taken for granted that the instructors take great interest in our lives as students,” she adds with gratitude. “Everyone has been so supportive in this journey.”

Avery earned her spot at the August auditions. A few days later she received what she describes as “a call of a lifetime” to join the Rockettes in the fall.

“The Christmas Spectacular is a 90-minute whirlwind experience, featuring nine numbers by the Rockettes,” Avery beams. “We do 200 kicks per show, sometimes four shows a day and up to 17 shows a week—that is a lot! You have to take good care of your body, but also mentally you have to be a smart dancer,” she continues. “They teach the show incredibly quickly and to be able to pick it up and apply every detail that's given takes a lot of mental focus.”

Given the show’s intensity, Avery chose not to take any classes last fall and resumed her studies in the spring—a decision, she found, the Penn LPS Online program team supported. “It’s nice to have a school that encourages us to go on and do the things that we're passionate about with the trust that when the time is right and when things have settled, I’m able to come back and continue my education right where I left off.”

Even when not taking classes, Avery says she can apply what she studies at Penn LPS Online. “I think that everything I'm learning in the classroom translates to my dance career now,” she says. “The challenges didn’t stop in my career after my big beginning,” she points out. “In my journey to become a Rockette, I actually auditioned three times over six years,” she shares as an example. “Those tools from positive psychology, like resilience and growth mindset, empowered me to keep going on my journey to eventually get to where I wanted to be.”

This year, Avery is thrilled to be invited back for her second season with the Rockettes. Once again, she will put her studies on hold through the holiday show’s rehearsal and performance season and return to class in the spring.

While the dancer in her is laser-focused on the present, Avery continues to think about her future, too. “For me, building a foundation of knowledge in leadership and positive psychology through the BAAS program has helped me form a vision of what I could do in my career beyond the stage,” she shares. Her aspirations include moving into leadership roles in dance education and the performance industry and maybe owning her own studio one day. She’s even considering graduate school.   

“Something really wonderful about pursuing my degree alongside a dance career is that I'm getting to enjoy learning again and fostering other parts of myself,” she says. And she’s able to set a manageable pace for her courseload that works for her. “I’m telling dancers about the Penn LPS Online program all the time. It feels like it’s made for us,” she says. “The program has been a perfect fit for me.”