501(c)(3) Nonprofit · Founded 2012

Empowering dancers,
anchored in research.

Raising the Barre is a youth-service nonprofit that gives dancers ages 10–19 the structure and opportunities to develop as leaders, serve their communities, and grow as people. We operate through a network of affiliated dance studios across the United States, with peer-reviewed research at the University of Pennsylvania and a study underway at Stanford.

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Raising the Barre.

Published 11 June 2026 in Frontiers in Psychology. Our mood-and-movement paper is now open access. A second study, on executive function in young dancers, is underway at Stanford.

Read the research
How the program is built

A program shaped around four pillars.

Leadership, responsibility, compassion, and confidence aren’t outcomes we promise — they’re the structures the program is designed around. Each pillar maps to specific, measurable participation each season.

i.

Leadership

Dancers serve as classroom teaching assistants — thirty-five classes per season — learning to plan, lead, and mentor younger students.

ii.

Responsibility

Three studio events per season, where dancers volunteer in operations roles — seeing the work behind a recital from the inside.

iii.

Compassion

Three community service events per season, with juniors and seniors leading at least one project of their own design each year.

iv.

Confidence

Senior dancers present at the annual RTB Gala on what participating in the program has meant to them — a public-speaking capstone.

From the UPenn Mood Study
85.8 %

of class sessions ended with dancers’ mood maintained or improved from before to after class.

Across 4,224 paired pre- and post-class measurements, post-class mood was significantly higher than pre-class mood (p < .001). The effect held across genres, age groups, class types, beginners and advanced, ballet and hip-hop.

Thirteen years on

The work, by the numbers.

25
Affiliated chapters
13
States with chapters
13
Years of scholarships
48
Scholars supported
Tiffany Henderson, founder of Raising the Barre.
A note from the founder

“We started Raising the Barre to give dancers a way to take what they learn in class — discipline, attention, courage to be seen — and put it to work in their communities.”

Tiffany Henderson
Founder, Raising the Barre · Master of Applied Positive Psychology, University of Pennsylvania (2025) · First author, Mood Changes in Dance Classes for Children and Adolescents
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A national network

Twenty-five chapters,
thirteen states.

Affiliated dance studios from California to Massachusetts run RTB chapters as independent youth-development programs. Studios pay an annual affiliation fee and gain access to a structured program, scholarship eligibility for their dancers, and the broader RTB community.

See all chapters Affiliate your studio
Three ways forward

Find your place.

i.

For dancers and parents

Apply to the program through a chapter near you. Eligibility, season structure, and scholarship requirements are documented in detail.

Apply
ii.

For studio owners

Add an RTB chapter to your studio. Annual affiliation fee, defined support package, and the ability to award scholarships to your dancers.

Affiliate
iii.

For donors and partners

Direct your gift to the scholarship fund, the research program, or general operations. Tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.

Donate