I’ve been a dance writer for over 20 years — published in numerous local and national magazines and newspapers. So when I was made aware of Orem dance-studio owner Kim DelGrosso running for Utah State School Board on an anti-inclusion platform, I was intrigued. And when I read The Salt Lake Tribune article (Courtney Tanner, April 14) quoting some of DelGrosso’s more applause-driven lines, I couldn’t look away.

Tanner’s article included a link to a video of DelGrosso’s campaign announcement that was widely circulated among the professional dance community. Upon hearing DelGrosso’s hurtful remarks some dancers reported feeling betrayed. (“I’m sickened by this gender identity stuff,” and “…pronouncing pronouns…I’m sorry, but that is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”) Others weren’t at all surprised.

My response was to sit down and transcribe the video word for word.

Later in April, DelGrosso used the same vitriolic language to secure the Republican endorsement at the GOP Convention for District 11 School Board over Republican incumbent Cindy Davis.

This year on the board, Davis, who has a Master of Education Leadership and Policy from the U, had a profound impact. She focused on one of Utah’s biggest problems — teacher burnout — and set about to reduce burdens on teachers by passing a rule to require fewer hours to maintain professional licensure. Among other things, she advocated for special needs students and set up a pilot program for intensive care students whose needs are so acute that most of us hope never to face such difficulties in our own families.

Some voters are more trusting of candidates that “speak their language” rather than using professional parlance, but when DelGrosso stumbles over familiar language calling “special needs” children “special interest” children, it makes me wonder if she is up to the rigors of the job.

Last week, when the SLCoGOP hosted its weekly forum “Town Hall Thursdays,” I decided to tune in. The hour-long debate featured DelGrosso vs. Davis (District 11) and LeeAnn Wood vs. Melanie Mortensen (District 4). As I had done with DelGrosso’s campaign announcement, I transcribed the debate word for word.

As I combed through answers to questions posed by moderator Marci Houseman (two previously submitted by the candidates and others taken from the online participants), I remained disturbed by DelGrosso’s culture-war assertions, but I was confounded by her complete lack of interest in budgets, teacher-student ratios, strategies to retain nutritional staff, bus drivers and support staff. School board members spend countless hours negotiating salaries, benefits, solutions to problems like the substitute teacher shortage, and how to support enrichment programs. For someone who is only fired up over masks, porn and transgender students, board meetings driven by Excel spreadsheets and white boards promise to be incredibly tedious.

I’ve never met Cindy Davis, but her answers to questions ranging from competency scores to masks seemed less about her and more about doing the job. For example, when the question inevitably arose about the draft of a document released by the Board of Education proposing a set of guidelines governing issues relevant to transgender students, Davis pointed to the 20,000 comments submitted by parents in a public comment forum. The 50-50 split in opinion required the board to move cautiously, she reasoned. DelGrosso’s response was vague and only applied to her feelings, “I feel like we need to have guidance, but it has to be very strong guidance. And I do feel like we need to listen to those comments. There’s a lot of people who have some very good advice…”

When Davis responded to what some are calling “porn” in the schools, she referred to HB374 [the bill passed in the legislature] with a resounding “Yes we need HB374,” but reminded us that the school board is required by law to act in accordance with the Attorney General’s Office and cannot make unilateral decisions. Davis knows the rules and emphasizes, “You don’t get to pick and choose when you abide by the law.” DelGrosso, apparently unaware of the process, accused the School Board of dragging its feet with innuendos such as, “It’s frightening to see how our board is allowing special interest groups to allow them to not make decisions, to table very important issues. Ruling making is the most important thing we can do.”

When the question about masks arose, Davis responded by differentiating between her more conservative personal opinion and the legal requirement of following the Governor’s executive order. DelGrosso bragged that she never required masks of her students, didn’t close her studio for one day, and hugged her students — this despite Utah County averaging 15-20 COVID-related deaths per day in mid-2021, and many of those children going home to hug grandparents who were at an exponentially higher risk of infection.

DelGrosso has criticized the School Board for “failing” a legislative audit. Anyone who has worked in a large organization understands that audits are required for such things as ensuring compliance with regulations and are also a practical assessment for the organization with recommendations of areas for improvement and areas of success. Davis did her best to explain to the self-employed DelGrosso, that audits are not pass-fail tests.

It’s really too bad that questions about budgets and teacher retention are at the bottom of the debate questions since those topics are top of people’s minds.

In her closing statement, DelGrosso said she wanted to “be a champion” for a long list of things, including for “children to keep their innocence.” But a visit to her studio website reveals pictures of young girls positioned with arched backs looking into the camera, and with legs spread open (fortunately away from the camera). Commercial dance has been criticized in studies and among dance professionals for sexualizing young girls and encouraging competition over artistry. Some commercial dance studios are guilty of this, others are not. Judge for yourself.

And when you vote for District 11 School Board, judge for yourself if you think DelGrosso’s boasting about “calling up the Governor’s son” to make demands is speaking your language or the language of privilege.

Kathy Adams was the dance writer at the Salt Lake Tribune (2002-2019) and has written about dance for Salt Lake Magazine, Dance Magazine, Dance Teacher Magazine and more.

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