Professional dancer teaches tools of her trade
By: Lacey Korevec
When professional modern dancer Mary Pat Robertson, director of the Princeton Ballet School, left New York in 1980 and moved to Princeton, she figured she was leaving her career behind.
"I moved here from New York because my husband was starting graduate school at Princeton University," she said. "I didn’t know much about the dance scene out here and assumed I’d be working at a retail store on Nassau Street and taking my life in a different direction. But that was before I found out about Princeton Ballet School."
After quickly receiving a teaching position at the school, Ms. Robertson eventually became the school’s director, a position she has held now for 20 years. She has run the school from behind the scenes, as well as in the studio, working with thousands of dancers in Central Jersey.
Princeton Ballet School is the official school of the American Repertory Ballet company and is made up of three studios, one on North Main Street in Cranbury, and ones in Princeton and New Brunswick. Twenty-five classes are taught per week at the studio in Cranbury, where approximately 200 children and 50 adults study.
While the Cranbury studio was established about 30 years ago, before Ms. Robertson was involved with the school, she has been a witness to many changes during the course of her time there, including the studio’s move from the basement of the old school house to its current location.
After searching for different locations in the area, the school was lucky to be moved only about 100 feet, she said.
"I feel that along with the wonderful Cranbury School, Princeton Ballet School creates an additional educational arts opportunity in Cranbury, which is a great thing for the area."
As director, Ms. Robertson has been instrumental in the development and success of programs such as the Rider University/Princeton Ballet School Dance Program and the Professional Training Program, for students interested in training to become professional dancers. She also worked on the school’s syllabus.
"It’s certainly been the majority of my professional life," she said. "It has been an extremely rewarding time and an honor to be able to shepherd this school."
Between all three studios, approximately 1,500 students take classes at the school and many participate each year in the school’s major performances, including Graham Lustig’s "Nutcracker."
"The school was big when I got here," she said. "It still is. And that’s nice."
One of the greatest rewards for Ms. Robertson, who still teaches four ballet classes a week at the Princeton studio, is seeing students from the school move on to professional careers. Though there are many who have had great success in the dance community, she recalled one student in particular who ended up choreographing work that was danced by Mikhail Baryshnikov.
"I see people who are teachers, who are doctors," she said. "It’s really neat that we can be a part of peoples’ lives like this and that dance has enriched their lives."
Part of her job includes having to travel each year to Boston, Washington, D.C., Florida, Los Angeles, Berkley, Calif., Seattle, Wash., Paris and, this year, Rome to audition young students for the American Repertory Ballet and Princeton Ballet School’s Summer Intensive program, which a number of Cranbury children take part in.
"I love the fact that it is so varied," she said. "I get to interact with many different groups of people ranging from fourth-graders to board members to advanced dancers, all over the U.S., whom I audition for our summer program. I really get to use a lot of different parts of my personality and my brain. And I enjoy that."
Realizing she has been in her position for a full 20 years feels odd to Ms. Robertson, who described it as a strange combination of having been there forever and having started only yesterday.
"The tagline I’ve been saying to people is, ‘Time flies when you’re having fun,’ " she said.
Ms. Robertson, who received a bachelor’s degree in French literature from Stanford University, Calif., received a New Jersey State Council of the Arts Choreographic Fellowship in 1983.
She has also been an active choreographer outside the ballet school’s studios, creating pieces for events like the former Opera Festival of New Jersey. Next year, she will lend her choreographic skills to New Jersey Opera Theater.
"That’s something on the horizon that I’m very much looking forward to and, of course, it’s very fun to look forward to the audition tour and all the kids I’ll meet there. But right now, I’m just settling into the semester. We just started three weeks ago, so fall semester still feels pretty new to me."

