Supporting Your Veteran and Active Duty Military Service Pole Students

Written by a retired service member who is also a pole teacher and performer.

As Veteran’s Day (November 11 in the United States) draws near, what is your studio doing to support our Veterans for this year’s holiday?

Instead of the typical posting of a “Support our Troops” sign and/or offer a % discount, consider broader win-win opportunities for our soldiers, sailors, and law enforcement folks.

Veterans are ideal pole students!

While every Veteran has their own story, many self-describe as “adrenaline junkies” and enjoy the camaraderie they found in service.

However, military regulations are stringent, and departing the service and finally breaking free of all those rules, sometimes our veterans may want to go a little wild.

Departing service members may feel lost without the community they’ve called home for so long and may make less optimal choices trying to re-create that adrenaline rush. Veterans are at higher than average risk for both suicide and alcoholism and they would benefit from better alternatives.

This is where you come in, pole instructors!

We all know the rush of our first invert and the class cheering as we celebrate each other’s accomplishments!

You can help fill the void and help struggling Veterans find a supportive community, discover new skills, provide a safe physical fitness outlet, and build your studio student base!

Working with Veterans in Your Studio

Before you engage Veterans or Active Duty service members as students ask yourself are you a co-ed studio?

Only 10% of today’s Veterans are women. This target audience could be very masculine—are you prepared for these prospective students?

More traditionally masculine body frames (especially those who have been in traditionally masculine roles like military service) may learn and move differently— their center of gravity is higher (more towards the sternum) so shoulder and upper body-based moves may be easier for them.

Additionally, Veterans literally speak a different language.

Their “get to know you” chit-chat may be different; asking about “MOS” (Military Operational Specialty) or various locations of deployments are two ways they find commonality with other Veterans.

Disability ratings through the Veterans Administration are common topics although medical privacy levels vary greatly among military folks.

Disabilities may need accommodations, and you may want to have conversations up front about things like flashing lights or loud noises (read more about improving the accessibility of your pole class here).

Finding Veteran Students

Veterans and military students are easy to find, but concern around participating in pole-related classes and activities is still very real in the military. You may need to clarify the use of stage names in class (rather than real names) and make sure your Veteran or Active Duty military students aren’t featured on your social media or marketing.

Some military branches or locations are more conservative than others.

If you live near a military base, contact their Morale Welfare and Recreation (MWR) office to get the word out to all military units in the local area that there are pole classes available. If there isn’t a base, each military unit has a unit Ombudsman that can help you connect to the members and families in that unit.

You could also contact local chapter of Wounded Warrior, Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW), or American Legion may allow you to post a flyer for a free trial or a Veteran-specific class.

If you have a local unit that’s getting ready to deploy, perhaps offer to teach a “welcome home” routine to the spouses of all genders could be great fun, but don’t press for information about where their loved ones are, or exactly when they are coming home as this is already a topic of great stress and you don’t want to add to it.

The military tends to coalesce around scored or competition style engagements, so don’t be put off if the class starts off with a more “in it to win it”-heavy vibe.

Your military member or Veteran may be more comfortable with fitness-based pole instruction before trying the sex(ier) stuff – but do offer a path to get there!

If you have an instructor who’s served previously, they would be a great fit to teach this class, and other students who may be interested in joining the service may find more questions honestly answered here than at their local recruiter’s office.

Veterans are members of our community who made sacrifices to protect and defend our nation, to allow us to enjoy freedoms to do things like express ourselves through pole and aerial. However, you choose to honor our Veterans this year – thank you.