Ballet student Nicola Thomson won a class trophy at the RAD Senior Awards Day in Edinburgh.

The bi-annual competition is open to students studying the RAD Vocational syllabus and attracted around 140 talented young ballet students from across Scotland. Over the day, they took part in repertoire, street jazz and musical theatre workshops as well as being judged in their ballet lesson by Christopher Hampson (Director, Scottish Ballet).

We were delighted to have 11 students gain a place at the event:

• Intermediate Foundation: Adela, Lauryn, Nicola, Rachel
• Intermediate: Alix, Andrew, Caty, Jennifer, Rebecca, Sarah
• Advanced: Christina

You can see a gallery of their photographs on our Facebook page.

Intermediate Foundation Class Award

Nicola (15) competed in the second Intermediate Foundation class and was presented with the trophy for her level. Judge Christopher Hampson praised her consistency in all areas of her class work including, effort, technique and musicality. (Above: Nicola with Christopher Hampson)

Nicola is in our Majors Programme and studies Grade 6 ballet, jazz and tap. She is also a member of Denny Dance Academy at Denny High School and has gained Higher Dance with an A and will be heading to train and perform in Broadway in June 2013.

Previous winners

We were delighted that former student, Natasha Watson, won the Advanced Class award and the overall prize. Natasha now trains full-time at Ballet West. She also won the Intermediate Foundation Award in 2008!

The Advanced Award had been won in 2005 by CSBS student Vicki Paterson who is now a professional ballerina.

Very well done!