“Asking Stanford” is a series of small stories from Stanford students that come together to highlight the diversity of experiences and perspectives on campus. To graduate, all undergraduate students must complete the WAYS-Creative Expression (CE) requirement.

DANCE 123: Choreography: Hot Mess & Deliberate Failure as Practice with Alex Ketley

When I was looking to fulfill my CE requirement, I wanted to find something that would be fun while also only requiring me to take one class. I ended up taking DANCE 123, a two-unit dance class that completely pushed me outside of my comfort zone in the best way possible. There was lots of twirling and screaming (I know, odd right?), but I totally would’ve taken it again if I had more room in my schedule. – Joanne de Pierre ‘25 M.A. ’26

DANCE 156: Social Dance III with Richard Powers

At first I enrolled in the Social Dance series because of the hype. I had no experience and no expectations. Then I realized what the hype was all about. It’s a wonderful combination of steps, figures, musicality and partnering. It’s fun to swap partners every three minutes in class and say “hi” to someone new. It’s refreshing not to worry about messing up and instead ensure that you and your partner are having a great time. Social Dance perfectly embodies creative expression: there are no mistakes, only valid interpretations and variations. In Social Dance III, the many opportunities to try role reversal vastly improved my partnering skills. Although there is still much more to learn, I felt immensely more confident to try new moves and discover new possibilities. – Jamin Xie ’28

English 91V: Creative Nonfiction with Keith Ekiss

The syllabus for Creative Nonfiction was filled with fantastic writers and engaging prompts. The personal essay we spent the latter half of the class constructing, deconstructing and restructuring is perhaps one of my favorite things I have ever written. I appreciated looking at my writing – and myself in my writing – through the class’s structure and the thoughtful questions and feedback Lecturer Keith Ekiss would provoke in our work. – Ribka Desta ’27

MUSIC 72D: Jazz Piano Class with Murray Low

Having spent most of life trained to play classical piano, the truth is I always found it difficult to feel joy in it. I never felt the music in a way that the truly gifted did, and the process of playing felt restrained and inadequate because I wasn’t able to create any music of my own. Even throughout those years, I always gravitated towards jazz pieces because they felt more free and expressive. After dancing to a lot of swing music, I decided that it’s finally time to try playing some myself. Jazz piano improvisation is a class where I’m challenging myself to apply music theories I’ve already learned and be more creative with it. We haven’t gotten to the improvisation part yet, but I’m excited to play my first piece on the fly as the quarter goes on, if I can somehow calculate my jazz chord progressions in a split second, of course. – Alaina Zhang ’27

ORALCOMM 129: Sound Stories with Laura Davis

Sound Stories was an incredibly meaningful and fun, but time-intensive way of satisfying my creative expression requirement. Instructor Laura Joyce Davis put so much energy into the class, and worked with everyone to tell a powerful version of their stories. The feedback she gave was helpful and impactful, and I improved significantly as a writer as a result. I was able to create my own podcast and publicly release it, and tell a story about something that was really important to me. I also got to collaborate closely with my peers. Each story was so meaningful, and I learned greatly about my fellow classmates. It also satisfied my PWR 2 requirement. – Victor Chen ’27