Dance: Vagle pushing past her limits

Chellette senior hoping for third trip to state meet

Russell Hodges
Posted 1/22/21

Senior dancer Jessie Vagle pushed herself beyond her limits as she and her Rochelle teammates twirled around the floor during their show-stopping performance of “Heart Cry” at the IHSA 1A DeKalb Sectional this past season.

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Dance: Vagle pushing past her limits

Chellette senior hoping for third trip to state meet

Posted

Senior dancer Jessie Vagle pushed herself beyond her limits as she and her Rochelle teammates twirled around the floor during their show-stopping performance of “Heart Cry” at the IHSA 1A DeKalb Sectional this past season.

Their result was not only a second-place finish and a trip to the IHSA State Championships, but it meant Vagle would have the chance to represent RTHS at the state meet for the second time in her three years with the Chellette dance program.

Vagle, who has been a dancer since she was 4 years old, will have one more opportunity to reach the state meet when she and her Chellette teammates resume their season this winter. Vagle initially took up dance as a way to socialize with friends, but as the years have passed, Vagle’s motivation for dancing has taken on new forms. Vagle is one of two seniors currently on the Rochelle dance roster who have been with the program all four years of high school.

“In the beginning, I mostly did dance for the friends I made,” Vagle said. “Later on, I did it for the exercise and to improve my skills. Dancing at RTHS has been a great experience. My goals for this year are to compete and hopefully do better than we did last year. We performed great last year, but we aren’t sure what to expect this year because we’ve had a lot of time off.”

The Chellettes were unfazed by pressure during their tremendous 2019-20 season. Furthermore, Vagle said she and her teammates consistently aspired to better themselves and perform better and better as the season progressed. For Vagle, her individual goals for her senior year are to continue improving her dance techniques, specifically her turns.

“Last season was a great experience,” Vagle said. “We’re always trying to better ourselves and do better than we did the year before. We had great choreography thanks to our coach. We did well at growing and improving as a group. We worked past our limits during the sectional meet, but hopefully we can push ourselves harder toward the beginning of this season.”