A turning point for a teacher of dance and dignity

Soon after moving to Alaska from her native Miami in the early '80s, dance teacher Lori Bradford brought ballet to the Bush through the Artists in Schools program.

"I lived in the villages with the families and I learned their traditions and daily routines as I taught them ballet, gymnastics and contemporary and creative dance," said Bradford, 59. "It was amazing."

That adventure was a turning point that led to Bradford's 27-year career as a beloved, groundbreaking dance teacher at West High School.

"I felt like if I were to find the career I really wanted it would be in a public school program where I could share my love of dance and also my love of humans," she said. "My top priority is not dance. It's teaching people to be good human beings and feel good about who they are."

She's released at least 5,000 West students into the real world with confidence, character and all the right dance moves. And now, Bradford, who students call Lori or Mom, is sliding off her ballet slippers and retiring this summer.

In her nearly three decades at West, Bradford developed the acclaimed DanceWest program, which presents two to three full-length dance shows a year and offers students an alternative to a more traditional physical education class.

For the shows, Bradford and her students have interpreted stories from "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" to "A Christmas Carol" through dance, and developed their own original compositions. Bradford and her crew do everything, including set and costume design.

Directing all the moving parts of DanceWest requires the kind of energy Bradford says she doesn't have anymore.

"Teaching dance 25 hours a week is a lot for anybody and at my age it's almost impossible," she said. "I can do it. But I can't do it as well as I know it needs to be done. I feel responsible that the kids get quality dance training."

Her retirement is an emotional moment for many, especially her students.

[Photos: Lori Bradford dances into retirement after 27 years at West]

"She's like the mom I never had. She's a mother figure to everyone," said Sahvanna Thompson, a West senior who is also Bradford's teaching aide. "Once you walk through those (dance studio) doors, there's no judgment. No one leaves you out. It's not even like you're at school. It's just a magical place we all like to call home. Lori brings that feeling because she's so nice and she cares about everyone."

Thompson said she had a bumpy childhood, moving back and forth between relatives, and that exploring dance with Bradford "helped me release all the emotions and sadness in my life."

Senior Joelle Sasis said her DanceWest experience has overflowed into her and her fellow dancers' lives outside the studio.

"We are much more energetic. We're able to say what we need to say with confidence. Everything about this program brings people out of their shell," she said. "Anytime I was stressed I'd come (to the studio) and Lori was always there to hear me out. I could always vent to her."

Bradford is deeply concerned about the future of West's dance program once she's gone. West is going through a budget crisis and changes, including the departure of principal Rick Stone, who is being transferred to another school this fall.

"My retirement shouldn't mean that the dance program disappears. I'm hoping that something I worked really hard creating and developing can continue," Bradford said. "It fills the space for kids who need artistic movement instead of sports movement. About 300 kids a year are fulfilled with dance as their way of getting their PE credit."

Principal Stone said if DanceWest is discontinued, it would be a major loss impacting the school and the community. He said that decision will be up to the incoming principal, and added that Bradford hasn't officially retired yet so there is no current opening for a new dance teacher.

"Lori has done amazing things. Our dance program is phenomenal. Kids from all over the city and even sometimes over the state come to West for the dance program," he said. "It's a community within our school where kids find a reason to go to school every day. She really built a family environment in the dance program."

Connecting past to present

A natural muse, Bradford has a way of spurring creativity in others.

That power manifested in May at "Reunion," the final DanceWest show of Bradford's career, and a tribute to the treasured teacher.

Bradford treated the alumni-filled audience to a rare, custom-choreographed performance that connected her West past to the present.

"It was one of the first years in a long time that I performed in a show. It's really hard to direct and perform," she said. "One of the things that was really important to me was bringing the alumni back and doing some of the dances from before."

Bradford did a number set to the song "This Is My Hair," choreographed by a former student. The alum modeled the new routine after a number Bradford performed at a DanceWest show 15 years ago when she was undergoing chemo for breast cancer.

The 2002 dance was set to "Hair" from the famous Vietnam War-era musical of the same name. Bradford, who was bald at the time, said she kept dancing off the stage and reappearing in increasingly long wigs as students in tie-dye hippie garb accompanied her.

That number was also developed expressly for Bradford. She said it was choreographed by teachers subbing for her while she was out sick.

Bradford attributes the qualities that make her such an empathetic mentor and role model to her mother. Bradford has a slightly disabled older sister, and when Bradford and her sister were little, her mother was told that enrolling her in dance would help her lose her limp.

Bradford was about 4 when her mom started taking her sister to ballet classes. Bradford soon showed strong signs of wanting to be a ballerina too.

"I would dance around and my mom couldn't handle me so she just put me in class too," Bradford said.

A frisky film career 

Before Bradford taught high school students, she played one in movies. Her pre-Alaska career consisted of modeling, dancing with Miami troupes, performing with The Florida State University Flying High Circus, and acting in films — including the most ridiculously risque movie series of the '80s.

"I was in the 'Porky's' series. I'm in all three of them. That's how I got in the Screen Actors Guild," she said. "For the longest time I never told anyone because I'm sort of ashamed of it."

She didn't have any lines. As a "special extra," she did stunts like a front flip off the top of the bleachers, was featured in dancing scenes, and just hung out as a cool high school girl.

Bradford was asked to appear in the classic scene where a high school boy peeps through a hole into the girls' locker room shower. She declined.

"When I got my job at (West) I thought to myself, thank God I said no," she said.

Shortly after her stint in the teen trilogy, Bradford met the reason she moved to Alaska: her future husband Ethan.

"He was visiting from Alaska on spring break and he was only in Miami for three days," Bradford said. "I just happened to meet him in a dance club in Miami Beach. So I asked him to dance."

That spin on the dance floor progressed into a pen pal relationship for a couple of years. In 1982, she moved with him to Anchorage, where Bradford's career took off quickly.

Two weeks after arriving, she was hired as a teacher at Alaska Dance Theatre. She was also a guest artist and student teacher at East High School and a choreographer for the Anchorage Opera.

In the mid-'80s she embarked on her Artists in Schools odyssey, which took her to places including Koyukuk, King Cove and Allakaket.

When East assistant principal James Bailey got transferred to West in 1990, he called Bradford a couple weeks into the school year and asked if she would be interested in starting a dance program.

"I didn't realize that was the best 'yes' I would ever say in my life. I never could have imagined the amazing program that would evolve out of everything," she said. "The first day they had me in the hallway outside of the auditorium because they didn't know where they were going to put my classes. I started out with two dance classes and an aerobics class. My dance classes got full really fast. In five years they made me full time, and still to this day my classes have waiting lists."

Art or dance?

As far as life plans go, Bradford is right on schedule.

She started in college as a double major in art and dance. After deciding she had to pick just one of those passions to do it right, Bradford had a life-altering dialogue with herself.

"Which one are you going to pick, art or dance?" she recalled asking herself. "When you're young, and you're still physically able, you'll do dance, and when you're done with dance, you'll go into art. You can still do art no matter how old you are and that will be your new career. I'm still going to do that. I'm just going to explore who I am as an artist again."

Bradford's visual art talent occasionally lined up with her dance teacher duties. For a fantasy and fairy-filled DanceWest show called "Mystique," she painted 22-foot trees on scene drops. "I was loving the hugeness of it," she said. "I love painting trees."

Bradford knows her mind will wander back to the DanceWest studio while she's seeking her new artistic identity.

"The thing I'm going to miss the most is the amazing inspiration I get every day from the kids that I teach. They're why I stayed so long," she said. "I love seeing them come into the program as completely shy, scared kids who grow into these amazing, confident talented young adults."