NEWS FROM STUDENTS AND ALUMNI--SEPTEMBER UPDATES
Kevin Ray ('11) and Liz Parker ('11) joined Lincoln Center Theater as teaching artists, growing their strong portfolios of work in the field.
Chelsea Hackett ('14) is getting her PhD at NYU on a full paid fellowship. She will be starting in January.
Suzu McConnell-Wood ('12) is now a music and drama teacher at The IDEAL School and Academy, an independent school with a social justice mission. Teaching all grades K-12. She has an amazing co-teacher (and American Idol top 10 finalist!) and she's excited to infuse more theatre into all curriculum subjects and call upon her IDC and TIE experience. She's really looking forward to directing devised musicals with both the 4th and 8th grades in the Spring and dusting off some Playbuilding, Co-intentional Directing and Group Theatre skills!
Heather Lanza ('14) is now Director of Education at Waterwell.
Michelle Payler ('15) began three new jobs this summer. She is now a New York Educator for Girls Leadership Institute, leading parent-daughter theatre based workshops on self advocacy, leadership, emotions, and communication; she is a theatre/dance teacher for various residences across the city in NY public schools for Marquis Studios; and she is an actor teacher with Making Books Sing.
This summer, Shawn Fisher ('16) and Nicole Serra ('16) conducted weekly forum theatre workshops with twelve men in a correctional facility in upstate New York. Shawn writes about the experience:
“In here, going to a counselor is seen as weak. This was a good place for us to open up with each other.” Statement of a prisoner following a forum on inmate suicide.
On August 25, the men played jokers and characters in two narratives they created: “Pressures of Prison” regarding inmate suicide and “Revolving Door” about challenges of reentry. Attending were general population and prison administration, both groups extremely receptive to the work. With a recent spike in suicide rates in NYS prisons, the director of programming elucidated her support: “We have to engage with population on the issue of inmate depression and suicide. Your workshop presented us with a golden opportunity.”
And this September, Wil Fisher ('11) and Michael Wilson ('11) conducted a Man Question workshop with a group of twenty men at a maximum security correctional institution in Connecticut, hosted by prison librarian Mark Aldrich ('14). Participants examined the impact of the expectations of mainstream masculinity on their ability to make work as artists and they worked together to create original pieces of theatre and poetry.
First year student Gia Harewood ('17) curated a mixed media exhibition in Washington, DC: Baggage Claim: Unpacking Immigrant Lives. Follow the link to learn more about the project.
Olivia Harris ('14) is teaching a course at Drew University called Applied Theatre: Sexuality, Diversity, and Violence. The course covers using theatrical techniques to address sexual violence on campus.
Marissa Metelica ('14) is the Community Theater Coordinator with the YWCA for a new program that she will be developing with a staff of artists at a middle school in Brooklyn. The idea is to create collaborative performances with students, teachers and parents, which promote healthy community and violence prevention.
Yvonne Roen ('14) has a new position as a teaching artist for an exciting new program at the YWCA, working with the Brooklyn Collaborative Middle School. She will be the Artistic Component of a critical literacy team that will be engaged in exploring the DREAM Act with middle schoolers, using the pedagogy of Boal and Freire!