Education
École des Sables, Africa’s Premier Dance School, Faces a Precarious Future
Toubab Dialao came to the rescue. This small fishing village was already an unlikely haven for artists: In the 1970s, the Haitian artist Gérard Chenet, a political exile, had settled in the area and built a hybrid art center, Sobo Badè, which boasts a theater and space for artist residencies, as well as a hotel and restaurant.
“Step by step, my father brought a lot of international artists,” Ibrahima Jacques Chenet, Chenet’s son, said at Sobo Badè. Some stayed and opened other art spaces, earning Toubab Dialao a reputation as a cultural village, Chenet said.
After holding some intensives at Sobo Badè, Acogny and Vogt looked for a space of their own. Acogny sold a small apartment she owned in Paris and Vogt added his savings to secure the grounds of the École des Sables and build the sand studio. Yet developing the school further, and making it financially viable, proved daunting.
“We would hold workshops with dancers from 25 African countries,” Vogt said, “but we had to find ways to cover the costs, because African dancers often don’t have the money to pay for training.”
In the absence of funding from Senegal’s ministry of culture, help has mostly come from European and American foundations, as well as the European Union; the luxury brand Chanel has been a partner for the past two years. Over the years, the school was able to build bungalows to house students and artists on site, as well as a second studio. But the lack of resources directed to culture on the African continent is an issue for artists, Acogny said. (Earlier this week, the budget for the African Dance Biennial, set to open on April 29, was still around $47,000 short, according to Vogt.)
About the data
The test score data for third- through eighth-graders in traditional public school districts comes from the Educational Opportunity Project at Stanford. A report on the new data was released on May 13 by the Education Scorecard, a joint project by Sean Reardon at the Stanford group; Thomas Kane at the Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard; and Doug Staiger at Dartmouth.
Researchers linked state test results with the results of a federal exam, the National Assessment of Educational Progress, to allow for comparisons across states. States were excluded if they allowed families to opt out of tests, recently updated their tests or were otherwise missing data.
Researchers identified districts in the same state that were similar in size, demographics and type of community, such as urban, suburban or rural.
This tool includes data for medium and large districts where scores were available. For districts missing 2015 data, The Times used an average of 2014 and 2016 scores as a baseline.
The University of Chicago will provide free tuition to students of families earning less than $250,000 a year, creating one of the most generous financial-aid offers in the nation at a moment when lawmakers and parents are scrutinizing the value of a college degree.
Colleges have been in a race to raise the income limits for free tuition in recent years. The university’s announcement on Wednesday explained the move as a way to make an institution with a $98,000-per-year sticker price more accessible to students from modest backgrounds.
“By deepening our commitment to affordability, we are helping to ensure that the brightest minds can join us,” Paul Alivisatos, the university’s president, said in a statement.
Chicago joins Princeton in raising its threshold for tuition to $250,000. Other selective schools have raised their income limits for free tuition to $200,000 in recent years, including Harvard, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania.
Some schools have hoped that improving socioeconomic diversity could help avert a loss of racial diversity after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down race-conscious admissions in 2023.
The free-tuition promises are meaningful because they help simplify the message around paying for college, said Sandy Baum, an expert on college finance with the Urban Institute, in an email.
“People think they will have to pay a lot,” she said. “They don’t understand the aid system. So they are much more likely to apply with this message.”
For a University of Chicago undergraduate living on campus, the cost of attendance includes $71,000 for tuition. The rest of the cost includes expenses like food, housing and fees. The university also said on Wednesday that it would cover those costs, in addition to tuition, for families with incomes of less than $125,000.
The university announced the new policy even as it faces financial troubles. The school has run budget deficits for many years, though it slashed the gap last year, partly by slowing down hiring. It remains $160 million in the red. School officials have said they are trying to close the gap by the end of the decade.
new video loaded: U.C.F. Students Boo Commencement Speaker for A.I. Comments
transcript
transcript
U.C.F. Students Boo Commencement Speaker for A.I. Comments
Students at the University of Central Florida booed a commencement speaker after she said that “artificial intelligence is the next industrial revolution.”
-
“The rise of artificial intelligence is the next Industrial Revolution. [booing] What happened? OK, I struck a chord. May I finish? Only a few years ago, A.I. was not a factor in our lives. [cheering] OK —all right. And now, A.I. capabilities are in the palm of our hands. And — oh, I love it.” “It felt like she did not know the crowd she was speaking to. It did not feel particularly inspiring for a bunch of young people about to enter the workforce in these creative fields. A lot of art students are pretty against specifically generative A.I. It can only spit things out that already exists. And I think a lot of artists, we want to tell stories from our own personal experiences. We want to create things that don’t exist yet.” “A.I., alongside human intelligence has the potential for — to help us solve some of humanity’s greatest problems.”
By Jackeline Luna
May 13, 2026
-
Indianapolis, IN2 minutes agoIndy 500 qualifying format, schedule, entries, how to watch this weekend
-
Pittsburg, PA8 minutes agoHere are all the free movies you can watch outside this summer in Pittsburgh
-
Augusta, GA14 minutes ago25-year-old woman killed in shooting on Cameron Drive
-
Cleveland, OH26 minutes ago
U.S. Navy warship to be commissioned in Ohio
-
Austin, TX31 minutes agoTexas Metro Areas Are Coming for Chicago
-
Alabama38 minutes agoGov. Ivey announces America 250 Alabama Celebration
-
Alaska44 minutes agoThis Alaska cruise port lets you experience the wild, untouched state
-
Arizona50 minutes agoDozens of repossessed Spirit Airlines jets now parked in Arizona desert
