En pointe

Spain Park student chosen for summer intensive at Royal Ballet School in London

By GRACE THORNTON

How hard is it for a 15-year-old from Hoover to make it into the summer intensive training program of the Royal Ballet School in London?

“Impossible,” said Pam Sayle, owner of the Alabama Dance Academy in Hoover. That is — unless you’re Meghan Gutowski.

Gutowski, a 15-year-old freshman at Spain Park High School, will be among the select students headed to the prestigious ballet school in July for the one-month experience. Numbers for this summer were not available, but last year, 2,458 students from all over the world applied, and only 659 were accepted, a school official said.

“It’s an exciting opportunity,” Gutowski said.

Her love of dance began at an early age.

“When I was 3, I would always dance around the house,” Gutowski said.

Her mom had never been into dance, and until that point, their family had mostly been involved with her brother’s sports.

But one day, she told her mother she wanted to dance.

“She found the closest studio and put me in a ballet class,” Gutowski said.

But it wasn’t love at first position or first plié. She didn’t like it — at all.

See GUTOWSKI | page A28