How these teens clap back on the apps trying to shape their lives

St Mary MacKillop Catholic College year 10 students on rehearsals on Thursday (l-r) Cailin Napier, 16; Sophie Kennedy, 15; Peyton Childs, 16; Carly Rundle, 15; Mia Skelly, 16; Ella Field, 15; Madison Willmott,15; and Siena Couto, 16. Pictureby Karleen Minney

In choreography created by themselves, young Canberrans are working out what the metaverse means to them - through dance.

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The Ausdance ACT's Youth Dance Festival, now in its fifth decade, will see more than 700 students from 27 schools take to the stage at the Canberra Theatre Centre on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, October 27, 28 and 29.

This year's theme, The Metaverse, invites students to create original choreography exploring how technology, gaming, social media and virtual connection are shaping the way young people live, learn and interact.

Rehearsals were under way at St Mary MacKillop College on Thursday, with 19 students in year 10 and year 11 participating in the youth dance festival, which is non-competitive and aligned to the curriculum.

MacKillop's co-ordinator of performance Charlotte Morphett said the students each year looked forward to the festival.

"We make it a part of our assessment task but we find it's a really lovely opportunity for them to experience live performance in sort of a professional setting and give them that industry experience, which is really good," she said.

The year 10 students are exploring the idea of finding their true self against social media algorithms trying to put them all in the one box. Picture by Karleen Minney

Each group of students had put a lot of thought into their performances, Mrs Morphett said.

"Both classes really looked at the idea of the virtual world being one, for them especially, that is quite all-consuming and what that means for their identity and their future. What does that look like?" she said.

"My year 11 kids are looking at the idea that you create different masked versions of yourself on different platforms and where does that line of the real you and the different versions of yourself lie? It's a blurred line. And when do we know it's our true self when we're constantly editing and presenting different versions of ourselves online?

"Whereas year 10 are looking at the way our identity is shaped by the algorithm that is fed to us and quite often the algorithm is the same for all of them so that we end up becoming the same person.

"They want to go against that grain and look at how we can be our true selves."

Rather than being sucked in by the virtual world, the students were sophisticated enough to know they were being manipulated and fed content that matched what the algorithm assessed they should be seeing.

"I was quite pleasantly surprised there was this analysis of the negative impact of the algorithm and what all these platforms are doing to their sense of self. They're fully aware of it, even though they are still on their phone all the time, they're really aware of it," Mrs Morphett said.

"It was quite a rich discussion actually."

St Mary MacKillop College coordinator of performance Charlotte Morphett, Ausdance ACT executive director Dr Cathy Adamek and Ausdance mentor Tanele Storm Graham. Picture by Karleen Minney

Ausdance ACT's executive director Dr Cathy Adamek said the public was welcome to watch the performances at the Canberra Theatre Centre, with tickets now on sale.

"It's coming together really well, it's very exciting," she said.

"I wanted a theme that was broad enough for them to be able to interpret it their own way. You don't see a whole bunch of pieces that are all the same, you see different interpretations.

"That's the great thing about the dance festival, it gets them to create their own works, original pieces, and their own choreography."

The students are looking forward to taking their performance from the rehearsal room to the stage in front of a big audience. Picture by Karleen Minney

Year 10 students Peyton Childs and Siena Couto, both 16, were excited to be performing their piece in front of a live audience at the Canberra Theatre Centre.

Siena said their piece was about breaking away from conformity and the online reality an algorithm wanted to present to them.

"At the start of our piece, our dance is very conformed, we're in unison, everyone is making short, sharp, dynamic moves," she said.

"And as the dance progresses, we're all starting to find our own feet and we're taking off our white shirts and exposing the colours underneath and finding ourselves and our uniqueness in all the hustle and bustle of the world.

"By the end, we've found our place and found our spot."

Peyton said the Ausdance ACT's Youth Dance Festival was "very community-based".

"It's all the ACT schools coming together and interpreting that theme given to us by Ausdance," she said.

"It's definitely exciting, especially seeing what the audiences take away from the performances."

• Ausdance ACT's Youth Dance Festival is on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, October 27, 28 and 29 at the Canberra Theatre Centre. Tickets are here.

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