Edel Quinlan from Wexford is off to the US to study ballet later this month. For the past two years she has been attending Inchicore College of Further Education in Dublin, preparing for a diploma in dance, which is awarded by the National Council for Vocational Awards.

Quinlan has also just finished preparing through Inchicore College for her teaching certificate exam. This is awarded by the Royal Academy of Dancing in London. She graduated earlier this year with a distinction.

Now after two years of intensive training and study, she has her heart set on a career as a performer, and she's off to follow her dream. This year she won a Fulbright Scholarship to go to Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan, to continue her studies in dance.

She'll pack her bags and leave her home town of Wexford later this month. She's confident and positive about the work she'll do in the year ahead of her.

"I'm delighted I was able to carry on for as long as I could here; having the experience behind me, I don't feel intimidated going to another centre.

"Right along I was always fairly interested in either primary teaching or Montessori teaching," she says.

But each year while she was at school at Loreto Convent in Wexford, she "kept up the dance, doing pantomimes and light opera", she explains.

Then in Transition Year she spent two weeks with Suzanne O'Leary, director of the Wexford School of Ballet and Modern Dance, and this opened her eyes to the ways a dance teacher can make a difference.

"O'Leary was very much into encouraging the girls to come out of themselves. It was very challenging. For some people they may not be able to express themselves."

Quinlan wanted to have a role like that, to "be able to do this through dance and particularly being part of a team, it was great," she recalls.

On completion of her Leaving Cert, she was accepted onto the PLC course in Inchicore College. There were 19 other young women on the course.

Her studies at the college for the past two years have included a physical dimension and an academic side. The class studied ballet technique and modern and contemporary dance each morning.

In the afternoon, they concentrated on the academic element with subjects such as anatomy, kinesiology (which is the study of movement), dance history and child psychology.

As students they were taught about proper diet and exercise too, she says.

They met with a dietician and a physiotherapist, who advised them about foods and exercise and how to take proper care of themselves. "It's important to maintain a correct diet," she says.

"They explain the sort of food we should be eating, how it will affect us, our bones, our bodies. It is important to know what's good for us. It really does help us."

The days began at 8.30 a.m. with a warm up session, starting with a dance class. After a break mid-morning, they continued with more dance, perhaps tap.

In the afternoon, they has classes and they generally finished up at about 4.00 p.m..

It was a very intensive course and quite strenuous, she says. It was hard to get into a routine every day. Up to then she had been dancing two to three times a week in Wexford.

But by October, she had got used to the intensive dancing routine.

Now it's what she wants to do full-time.

The course at Antechoir College did prepare her for further studies, she says. She's delighted that she has studied the Martha Graham Contemporary Technique at the college under one of her teachers, Darien Brown.

She's confident that it's what the students in Michigan will be familiar with.

"At the end of the day, it's going out and giving a performance to an audience, that's what I want to do. Being ready for stage performance that's what drove me when I was studying in Antechoir."

In case things don't work out as a dancer, she has her teaching certificate, but, she adds: "I really want to go out and perform. That's what this year is all about."

Her dream, she says, is to return and dance with a company in Ireland.

Edel Quinlan: remember the name.