Meet our Service Chairs!

By Evey Howe

In line with BodyHype’s commitment to using the arts to promote service, Ana Villada ‘24 and Cassie Eng ‘25 stepped up as our first ever co-service chairs to introduce many great service initiatives this year! 

When asked about why she decided to run for service chair, Cassie said that she wanted to “help Princeton students in BodyHype see that community action can be connected to any discipline or aspect of life, including dance, to further encourage a culture of giving and empathy”. Cassie has been dancing since she was 6 years old, and believes that dance has helped her discover who she is through creativity and art and can also be used as “a tool for storytelling, a way to connect across cultures, and share joy and hope.” She hopes to utilize the power of dance to promote service in these ways. Ana shares that she joined BodyHype for a number of reasons, “but one of the main ones being the diversity and willingness to learn [that she] saw in so many members.” Ana is deeply passionate about both service and dance, and she says that “being able to combine the two [as co-service chair] has been an incredible experience” for her. 

One of the initiatives that our service chairs introduced this year is the monthly Diversity, Equity and Inclusion newsletter in which Ana and Cassie compile artists, books, music, and articles relevant to dance, in honor of significant events such as Black History Month, International Women’s Day and National Month of Hope. The Service chairs hoped that the DEI newsletter would spark more reflections and conversations around diversity, equity, and inclusion among BodyHype members. Cassie hoped this would be possible by “bringing to light issues of representation in dance, erasure of culture and history (specifically Black culture and history that influenced the dance we love and are guests of), and socioeconomic status and accessibility to dance resources.” Ana emphasizes the importance of educating ourselves as artists when she states, “Being a dancer also means being an educated dancer, if we are not constantly challenging ourselves to learn more we aren’t doing enough.”

The service chairs have also introduced a speaker series to BodyHype; the first guest being Professor Harvey-Salaam (aka MamaDy) who came to talk to the Company in Late March. Ana says that “MamaDy is a teacher I personally hold near and dear to my heart… being a company that takes a lot of influence from Black culture, and Cassie and I both not being Black we felt it was important to hear from someone with a lot of influence in the community.” In honor of Black History Month, the Service Chairs also worked alongside Core to host a company wide screening of “UPROOTED,” a documentary about the history of jazz dance. 

“Every day, I was in awe of how the donation count continued to rise and felt so proud and moved by the support we received from our family and friends. In total, we raised $2,317.07 which we donated to support Color of Change’s campaigns for anti-racist systemic change.” - Cassie Eng

The Service Chairs’ work this term culminated in the show fundraiser, in which they raised money for Color of Change, a non-profit that empowers the Black community through challenging systems of inequality and advancing solutions for racial justice. The service chairs and the rest of the company worked hard to fundraise for Color of Change by promoting the fundraiser through social media and hosting an auction of BodyHype merchandise to raise money for the further raise money. Reflecting on the success of the fundraiser, Cassie says “Every day, I was in awe of how the donation count continued to rise and felt so proud and moved by the support we received from our family and friends. In total, we raised $2,317.07 which we donated to support Color of Change’s campaigns for anti-racist systemic change.”

When asked about the future plans for their next term as service chairs, Cassie and Ana hope to organize a Day of Service with BodyHype, “perhaps in collaboration with the social chairs, where the company bonds by giving back to our community in a day of volunteering.” They also plan to continue their current initiatives such as the DEI newsletter and workshops that allow the members of the company to reflect and discuss how we can further incorporate more values of DEI within the company and at Princeton. The service chairs have had a spectacular first term and we cannot thank them enough for all the work they have done to incorporate service into BodyHype’s mission!