Open Forum

Running a Drama Club

When I first became a theatre director I really struggled with my thespian officers and keeping the club moving in a positive direction.  There were clicks in my group and often the officer’s in the club were the click leaders or kept a lot of the “drama” in drama club alive.  I had high expectations of my officers but did not really have a clear way to develop them as leaders. 

Some things I quickly learned:

Meet with your officers outside of club meetings. My officer’s and I met every Monday after play rehearsal. These meetings were usually quick but were invaluable for planning your meetings and helping your officers build rapport with both you and one another in their leadership roles.   Students develop the agenda and delegate responsibilities for what needs to happen prior to the meeting.  We always wrote it down, put on a bulletin board in the office so everyone could check frequently. This helped our meetings run smoother and all officers felt included. If you were not at the Monday meeting, you were just a drama club member that week. On weeks we did not have a drama club meeting, we planned our monthly event and determined everyone’s responsibilities for the event.  (I had a drama club board versus officers.  I preferred this as no one could ever say “That’s not my job.”  Having a board also helped create more shared responsibility!)  

A couple of times a year we had an officer event.  We went to dinner and sometimes a movie together to help build a bond with one another.  I became more of a person to them and a member of their board versus the theatre sponsor.  We attended leadership camp through AZ Thespians and used that time to plan out our entire year.  We put monthly events on the calendar, discussed what our goals were going to be as officers and looked at what worked and what did not in the previous school year.  If your state does not have a leadership camp, make your own. Meet at your school before school starts and if you have some leadership training you can do, even better!!! Consider asking another school or two to come also. You can revisit your goals throughout the school year.