Mia Zaia is a Dance major with a minor in Communications who presented her senior project this Spring quarter. Mia's senior project was a survey research project exploring career satisfaction for dancers in the United States. Often feeling like dance is not seen as a useful career, Mia wanted to explore if other dancers have had similar experiences. She also wanted to investigate the reasons why the United States seems to value the arts less than other countries. Mia wished to uplift dancers despite these ongoing issues and conducted an improvisation session with two other dancers which was shown at the final presentation on April 14th, 2023.

Mia has showed her own exploration of who she is as a dancer through video of her improvisation structures as a self-exploration exercise in order to regain her confidence as a dancer. Her dancing fosters her intellectual curiosity and in a way is also collaborative through the community research aspect. Mia’s project advocates for salary fairness, respect, and open-mindedness towards all career types.