Julie Woffington, executive director at the Educational Theatre Association, oversees the organization’s many programs geared toward providing theater experiences to students and teachers within and outside the U.S. through the International Thespian Society. According to Woffington, the society, founded in 1929, has inducted over 2 million students since its inception. Woffington handles strategic planning, oversees the budget, and prioritizes goals for EdTA.
How can schools get involved with ITS or EdTA?
They can start a thespian troupe in their school. It’s usually the theater teacher who would start that, and they can do it through our office. They can charter it online or by calling our membership department. They just need six students to start.
What do teachers need to know before starting a troupe?
They just need support from the principal. We have a lot of resources on our site and a membership department that can hold their hand. We give tips on how to help use the troupe to get recognition, press, and opportunities for the students that also bring recognition to the school. Also, we have a service center that’s available during business hours. We have four people to answer the phones and work with teachers to help them get set up, answer their questions, and help them use the materials we have.
Where can theater geeks get additional support?
We have an online community that’s really incredible. Anyone who wants to sign up can; it’s free and we have over 6,000 people on there and every day. For example, this morning there were 26 discussion posts just from the last 24 hours. People are having discussions about which plays to select. There’s a dialogue right now about if a student quits right before the show, how do you handle that? They can also upload and download documents so they can get a lot of ideas.
What else do EdTA and ITS do?
We have a lot of advocacy programs. We were in Washington, D.C., at Arts Advocacy Day. We advocate on a national level for theater and arts education policies, but we also help advocate at the state level and even at the school level. We give them research and data that show the impact that arts education can have on students and why it’s important to preserve and grow their program.
What events do you offer?
We have the International Thespian Festival, which is our biggest event. Once a year, students from all over the country and others from outside of the U.S. are able to perform on a main, national stage. They get workshops from professionals. A lot of people come from New York and Broadway to teach at this. They get access to colleges. There are over 60 colleges there that they can audition for and meet at the exhibit hall.
What’s up next?
We’re just announcing a new program called JumpStart Theatre. Our vision is that every student will have access to theater in their school. What we’re finding is there’s a big gap in access between the high-poverty area versus the areas that have resources, so we’re starting a program in middle schools that have no theater at all where they have to apply and we give them three years of support to teach them how to direct a musical after school with existing resources, existing teachers through training, donating materials. A mentor comes and visits the school every week. After three years they’re able to sustain on their own an afterschool musical theater program.
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