Cheryl Burke is waltzing in with her opinion on Dancing With the Stars.
The dance professional—who retired from the competition series in 2022 after 26 seasons as a pro—recently shared that she thinks the show’s judging panel should hold contestants to “true ballroom dancing” standards, which may require more studying on their part.
“You have to know what you’re talking about, right?” she said on the Dec. 4 episode of her Sex, Lies and Spray Tans podcast. “They have to be able to back up whatever they say. If you’re just saying things because you know it’s the right terminology, and you can’t explain yourself as to why it should be a certain way, then it’s kind of hard.”
Burke also noted that the judges—which include Derek Hough, Carrie Ann Inaba and Bruno Tonioli—are “not experts in the niche of ballroom dancing” which means they “can’t really be more strict in [the] genre.”
Burke—who was married to Boy Meets World alum Matthew Lawrence from 2019 to 2022—was also adamant about her opinion that the panel should take an adjudicator’s exam, a test administered by the National Dance Council of America that, according to the organization’s site, qualifies people to judge national dance competitions in all styles of the craft.
“Just like the pro dancers have to continue to educate themselves on their craft,” the 40-year-old continued, “I also feel like the judges should do the same.”
“I think that’s important, and why wouldn’t you wanna do that?” she added. “After all these years, if you weren’t as familiar with the genre, why don’t you familiarize yourself with it?”
But, as Burke admitted, she is not aware if the panel—which used to include the late Len Goodman, who was previously a professional ballroom dancer—already has that distinction, saying, “Maybe they have, I don’t know. I’m not them.”