Derek Hough on ‘DWTS’ Transition to Disney+, Season 31 Standouts, and Partnership With Southwest Airlines Teach the Love (Exclusive)

Dancing With the Stars wouldn’t be what it is without Derek Hough. The six-time mirrorball champion spent nine seasons on the show as a pro before transitioning into the judging chair in its 29th season. Hough received eleven nominations for the Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Choreography for his work on the show, winning the award three times. Outside of the series, he’s worked as an actor and dancer in Footloose: The Musical, Make Your Move, NBC Live’s rendition of Hairspray, and had a recurring role in the ABC musical-drama Nashville. Hough has also judged World of Dance. But DWTS is home for him. And as a dance instructor, he wants other educators in all fields to be able to experience a slice of what he has. That’s why he’s partnered with Southwest Rapid Rewards credit cards from Chase for the Teach the Love Campaign. 

Hough serves as an ambassador in the campaign. The contest allows teachers to be nominated to travel to five education-packed destinations and have their hotels, flights, and excursions fully covered. There’s an educational component to each location selected. The selected towns and hotspots are Maui, Hawaii for marine biology fans; Chicago, Illinois for fine arts and architecture lovers; Washington, D.C., for American History buffs; Palm Springs, California for geology fanatics; and Nashville, Tennessee for music connoisseurs. Nominations will be accepted from Oct. 5 through Nov. 9. All submissions can be entered via the contest website (which will be live on Oct. 5). Three grand prize winners will be allowed to select from the locales. Seven runners-up will also be chosen to receive 30,000 Southwest Rapid Rewards points to use towards their own Edu-vacations. 

PopCulture spoke with Hough about why this contest is so timely and what it means to him as a lover of educators. He also dished exclusively on DWTS’s new format, and who he thinks can take home the mirrorball this season. 

PC: First and foremost, congratulations on your partnership with Southwest Rapid Rewards. Tell us about how this partnership came about.

DH: I’m teaming up with Southwest Rapid Rewards credit cards from Chase to launch this Teach the Love Contest, which is a contest about giving back to teachers and educators, which I’m very passionate about. Mentors and teachers in my life have really impacted my life tremendously. And now more than ever, especially with the pandemic and all these things that have happened, they’ve been absolute superheroes.

Southwest is creating this amazing contest called Teach the Love contest and they’re going to basically be rewarding these teachers with these amazing trips. They’re calling it an “edu-vacation,” which is perfect because it’s an education [experience] and a vacation wrapped in one. It’s a great contest, and it launches October 5th, which is also World Teacher Day. Kids (18+) or their parents can nominate those teachers in their lives that have really gone above and beyond changing these kids’ lives and just being amazing teachers.

It’s amazing. It’s a great contest that’s giving back. I always say that the secret to living is giving. Whenever we’re giving, whenever we’re serving, we’re always at our best. I think that this is a perfect contest to give back to the teachers. For those who want to enter, nominate a teacher, you go to chase.com/teachthelove and nominate your favorite teacher or your favorite educator.

I’m excited. I kind of all laid it all out there, but I love traveling so much. It’s a huge part of my life. It’s something that inspires me constantly in everything that I do. I’m a forever student, and I’m so thankful for all the teachers in my life that have impacted me. This is a perfect marriage of travel and education and giving back.

PC: How does the contest work? You said that a student or a parent of the student can nominate the teacher, and then from there, what happens? Does the teacher then go on a vacation of their dreams, or is it an educational trip? How does it work?

DH: A parent or a student can nominate their teacher. If they win the grand prize, they get to go on an amazing trip, which is a fantastic, but also there’s an educational element as well to it. Let’s just say Washington DC, for instance, which is a fantastic place to go to learn, but also to enjoy yourself. Actually, my favorite restaurant in the entire world is in Washington DC, of all places. I can’t believe it. It’s a mixture of both, between just pure education, pure vacation and education, hence the name edu-vacation. Because part of that too is to inspire the teacher as well. Me being a coach and a teacher myself, when I travel, I get inspired, I get moved, and I bring that back with me, and I implement that into creative ideas or things that I can do to create. That’s what this is about as well, is also to inspire the teachers and to let them come back and then to continue being an amazing educators and an amazing teacher. 

PC: To what extent are you involved in the contest? Are you just an ambassador of this entire thing or how involved are you?

DH: Yeah, pretty much an ambassador. I want to get the word out because I want as many people to nominate these teachers as possible. Again, I just reflect back on teachers in my life who have impacted me tremendously, and I might even have to nominate one of my teachers, from back in the day. I think back at those teachers, and if there was something like this, even back then when I was younger, I would love to have them have this experience to go travel and to get inspired and motivated and just to feel seen. To feel seen for all the hard work that they’ve done, and that’s what it’s all about.

PC: Now, you mentioned earlier, briefly about how teachers really became the superhero of the pandemic. And there is a lot of dialogue going on right now about teacher shortages nationally and adequate pay for teachers. How do you feel as if this contest helps fill that void or at least does something to show our love for our educators? What do you feel needs to be done to keep teachers in the field?

DH: I think what you said before was teachers are our absolute superheroes. We are so lucky to have educators and especially educators who go above and beyond. Again, I just speak from experience, the teachers that have changed my life. And it wasn’t from the curriculum books, it wasn’t from the textbooks, it was just from their hearts, it was from their souls. It’s kind of funny that Southwest is the heart of the skies, and these teachers have such great hearts.

For me, I think it’s just giving opportunities to these teachers, giving opportunities for them to do what they do best, which is to educate and to give and to serve and say let them be seen and to let them feel appreciated. I think that it’s just – even small acts like that – just feeling that appreciation and something like this, I think, can go a long way. That’s why I think it’s just fantastic, with this contest and hopefully giving back to the teachers that deserve it.

PC: I want to switch gears a little bit and talk about some other things that you’ve had going on before and after this. You’re an alum of Dancing With the Stars – and you won the Mirrorball six times during your tenure. There have been some big changes since you’ve exited [as a dancer]. There are two new hosts who are now on the show, and it’s also now streaming on Disney+. What’s your take on what’s going on with the franchise?

DH: I am, I’m very excited about it, actually. It feels like a relaunch, and now being a judge on the show, I’m in a different position. But what I feel with this particular season so far, is there’s a lot more warmth and heart, that for me, being a part of the show for so long, I remember in the earlier days really that there’s like this nostalgia I feel with this season.

What I actually love about Disney+ is, one thing, is there’s no commercials. We just, we just go. Derek Hough. It just goes. It’s just nonstop action, and it’s wonderful, and it gives us more time to tell stories and actually to get to know the celebrities and to have a little bit more time to breathe. I really, really love it. 

There’s some growing pains. There’s some growing pains with people getting used to the streaming aspect of something. But that’s where things are moving, and the writing’s been on the wall for a few years now, and I’m really proud of Dancing With the Stars for being sort of the first to take that leap and to take that step into the unknown, as the first show of its kind to do something like this.

No doubt there’ll be many more shows to follow suit. But so far, it’s been a huge success. It’s been an absolute huge success. Having the new host, with Alfonso [Ribeiro] joining the season, it’s been fantastic, and it’s a great cast. Honestly, we were all kind of nervous. You know, we’re like, “Oh, what does this mean?” But so far, it’s been an absolute standout success. We’re very, we’re thrilled. We’re thrilled.

PC: Now going from being a pro on the show to being a judge, obviously that’s been a transition. And something else that I was thinking of before we stepped into this interview is, do you feel as if the show has stuck to its original method of getting legendary stars and giving them a reboot of their career through this show? Or do you feel as if it sort of changed a bit. Because I feel like for the first few years, they really featured non-dancers as the stars that they chose to select, as the stars that they chose to participate in the show. But in recent years, that’s kind of changed, and you’ve had gymnasts, whereas if they may not be professional dancers, but that training really does benefit them in the long run. How do you feel about that? Are you OK with it or do you feel as if it puts a lot of the others who are non-dancers or have none of that as their background at a disadvantage?

DH: I think it’s a great mix. I think that if we just had absolute non-dancers from scratch – I think over the years, America has been really been educated with dance. They understand. 10 years ago, if I said a Pasadoble, you’re like, “Wait, what’d you say?” Now I see a guy, he’s like, “Hey man, I like that New Yorker section in that Cha-cha.” It’s like there’s this understanding of the dance. I think that it’s good to have some higher levels of dance, so people who want to see that, can appreciate that and, “Wow, the choreography, I love that.”

Or somebody who prefers to see somebody who’s never danced before, really start at ground zero and see the progression. The truth is, it might seem like a disadvantage, but we’ve seen that it’s not. 

Last season, [we had[ Iman, you had Jojo Siwa – who was a dancer. But Iman, who’s a basketball player, who’s never danced in his life, he won. He won the show. I think that it’s a double-edged sword. When you have experience, people expect more from you, therefore, it’s harder to surprise people or to impress people versus if you’re a beginner, people will actually be rooting for you a lot more. It kind of balances itself out sometimes in people’s opinions or the way they feel about somebody on the show. I think it’s a good balance to have a mixture of people with experience, people without experience, people in between. It’s good to have a bit of both.

PC: You spoke a bit about how dance has been really an educational tool for its viewers, and I definitely agree. I think that it’s been at the forefront of entertainment in recent years, with shows like Dancing with the Stars or World of Dance, which you were on, or So You Think You Can Dance. How are you hoping to see this level of education and love and appreciation for the art form expand with other projects that you may be involved in?

DH: For me, dance is, I believe is in all of us. It really is. I think that before we could walk or crawl, you know, put music on and babies bob around. It’s in us. It’s in our bodies, it’s in our DNA, and I think somewhere along the line, we forget about dancing or just forget the word dance, moving. Freedom of movement. I just love being a part of a show that gives an opportunity for people to rediscover or to reclaim this part of themselves, this awareness of their body and how to move it.

I think it’s extraordinary. The show couldn’t be around for 31 seasons unless it was tapping into something into the audience at home. I think that that’s what the show does. It taps into this inner dancer or this inner, “I wonder if I could do that, or maybe I should try that. Maybe I should stay step out my comfort zone.” There’s so many different things that inspire you within this show. To see that appreciation, especially for dance too, because where I grew up, it wasn’t really a popular thing, especially for boys.

There was this weird stigma around dance, and it was kind of bizarre actually, if you think about it. Especially since if you go back to the beginning of time, that’s how we celebrated, that’s how we mourned. That’s when we did rituals, that’s how we came together as communities. It’s with food and dance. Literally, those are the two things of how we came together as people and dance somehow along the line, got… It became a niche thing.

It’s really cool to see Super Bowl champions and these amazing athletes and gymnasts or Grammy Award winners or Oscar winners or just people from all different walks of life, love and appreciate dance. It’s really extraordinary. 

We were talking about the teachers and about this Southwest Rapid Rewards credit cards from Chase, this contest with Teach the Love contest, and the teachers in my life, especially one of my dance teachers changed my life. Literally changed my life. That’s what I love about this whole contest is the teachers, the giving back, and the appreciation, and of course, travel, which is something I’m very passionate about. It’s kind of a perfect thing.

PC: Before I let you go. Who are your standouts in Season 31 so far? Who do you think can take it all the way?

DH: I think there’s a few people, some are not obvious. I think that you look at people, you go, “Oh well they might be one of the better dancers.” But there’s a lot of people who I’m like, “There’s a lot of potential there that I think they might do something, they might have that moment that just changes everything.” 

I think Jordan Sparks is just magnetic. She has a great presence. Wayne Brady is just an iconic performer. I think Charli D’Amelio, I think she’s a great dancer, and I think that she’s, the shyness about her that I think that it’s going to be great to see her sort of open up with through dance, if that makes sense. Trevor Donovan actually, of all, he surprised me last week. He was really fantastic. I think he did a great job. Yeah, there’s a handful of people that I honestly think I’m really looking forward to. Oh, Gabby from The Bachelorette, she’s fantastic. 

Who knows? We’ll see what happens. I think that after this week, we’re going to start to see people start to break down or start to excel. Now, we start to see that the first two weeks are kind of like, “Okay, let’s just get a lay of the land,” and now we’re going to start to see things start to unravel.