List of Contributions

RE: American High School Theatre Festival to perform at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 05-03-2024 16:09
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

I have taken students twice and I'm gearing up for a third go in 2025. Yes, it IS worth the expense as it is life changing both for my students and for me. Not only is everything taken care of for us (accommodations, travel, insurance, performance venue...), but we also get to give students a taste of ...

RE: The Lightning Thief - Specialty Costumes

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 12-14-2023 11:59
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

I did Lightning Thief two years ago. I made the snake hair using a headband, florist's wire, and lots of rubber snakes of various colors and lengths. It was a lot of fun to make! I also doubled it by attaching a second headpiece to a foam head for the beheading. It worked really well! For the furies, ...

RE: Marketing your Theater/Tech class

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 03-02-2023 11:57
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

Probably the most useful thing I've done is survey alumni to see how taking my classes have benefited them in college and the working world, what their majors were and what their current fields are, then I used those statistics on a flyer that lives on my class websites. A couple years ago, I had students ...

RE: "Scholar Athlete" Award for Theatre?

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 10-25-2022 14:38
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

While other schools have thespian banquets, I recognize and honor my graduating thespians at our school's official Senior Awards Night. I use the official ITS criteria for award levels and make sure they're all announced for each student in this order: honor status, scholar status (ex: International ...

RE: Masks

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 08-31-2022 14:41
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

Hi Chad I totally get where you're coming from. I used clear masks for several shows last year, and went maskless for my spring musical. In order do to the latter, the entire cast tested for COVID every week. Masks were worn during rehearsals up until our final dress. As a result, my cast remained healthy..... ...

Junior Thespian Troupe

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 08-25-2022 17:17
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

Curious - how would a high school troupe director (me) go about establishing a junior troupe for the two middle schools in my unified school district that don't have theatre programs but students can participate in musicals run by an outside organization? ------------------------------ Kaila Schwartz ...

RE: Musicals for everyone

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 08-22-2022 11:16
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

I hope this isn't too radical of an idea, but you might want to consider just choosing a musical that you really want to do, and will appeal to everyone, and simply cast it according to ability and not background. I teach in an incredibly diverse community (over 30 languages spoken) and I cast whoever ...

RE: Advice needed

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 05-02-2022 09:47
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

So... basically.... you're saying that the guidance counselors at your school are intentionally allowing student transcripts to misrepresent student course load. Sure, that's a great look on your school. I'd take it up the ladder. This isn't cool. ------------------------------ Kaila Schwartz Theatre ...

RE: Help with a question, please

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 12-06-2021 14:35
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

Great question, George! I agree with what others have already said regarding being a one-person department with too many balls in the air. This has been a major cause of stress for me heading into tech for every production I've directed where I work. I think it's not so much that everything gets ...

RE: Theatre for Social Change

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 08-16-2021 11:03
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

I was actually going to make the same recommendation. I LOVE Idris Goodwin's plays and have used them in my classes as well as in performance. The students really enjoy working with them and talking about them. Here's a direct link. Just scroll down to the Free Plays portion for links to each of the ...

ethnic studies theatre course?

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 04-07-2021 21:41
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

Hi everyone. I'm in the very beginning stages of creating a new theatre course with an ethnic studies focus and I was wondering if any of you teach a course like this already? My idea is to look at theatre as a means of creating revolution, building bridges, and social change. We'll study agitprop, teatro ...

RE: Not a True Elective

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 01-04-2021 13:32
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

I think you're taking the right approach. Find out what they might be interested in learning about and get their buy-in that way. ------------------------------ Kaila Schwartz Theatre Arts, Director Milpitas High School ------------------------------

RE: Anyone here using or teaching SketchUp?

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 12-10-2020 14:33
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

I successfully taught it this year for the first time! It was a combination of your tutorial and a Set Design for Theatre Class video on Vimeo that gave me the confidence. I had my students use the vimeo tutorial for step by step instructions and most of them were able to produce something pretty cool ...

RE: Help!

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 09-07-2020 13:23
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

In short, yes. Last spring, I produced a show for my graduating seniors who were robbed of their final performance. This fall, I'm doing two online productions - one is a Halloween murder mystery all on zoom and the other is a devised piece - also completely on zoom. Both are student written. And the ...

RE: Free stage models for use with SketchUp

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 04-24-2020 14:28
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

George, I have also tried learning SketchUp on my own, and I've felt nothing but frustration. I would LOVE LOVE LOVE a zoom session on this!!! ------------------------------ Kaila Schwartz Theatre Arts, Director Milpitas Unified School District San Jose CA ------------------------------

RE: Best Advice to Students When They Wish They Had More Lines

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 03-06-2020 13:46
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

This doesn't often happen at my school. At auditions, I talk about what I need for the full cast, including ensemble roles. I talk about how important ensemble roles really are and how much fun they can be. And most of the time, every cast member is just happy to be in the show. But the one time it happened ...

RE: Human-migration or refugee themed plays

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 02-24-2020 10:34
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

Last year, I produced Rowing to America: The Immigrant Project. (Dramatic Publishing) It's a collection of short plays (comedy and drama) about immigrants from all over and it beautifully covers the immigration experience (which isn't always beautiful). You don't have to do all of the plays in the collection ...

RE: Dramatic two woman scene with lesbian characters

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 01-23-2020 11:10
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

There's also The Killing of Sister George.... I remember doing a scene from it while I was in college. ------------------------------ Kaila Schwartz Theatre Arts, Director Milpitas Unified School District San Jose CA ------------------------------

RE: Experience with Avenue Q?

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 12-11-2019 14:23
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

I did Avenue Q as soon as the High School Edition became available and I loved every second! So did my audiences. I sold out all performances and there were zero complaints. There is an optional swap out for the erection song, but I did not choose that option. Honestly, once Chip starts throwing candy, ...

RE: She Kills Monsters YA cheerleader/football uniforms

Posted By Kaila Schwartz 09-24-2019 14:43
Found In Egroup: Open Forum \ view thread

We got ours from our cheerleading team. They have a box of old uniforms that I pulled from. Worked perfectly. -- ~Kaila Schwartz, BFA, M.Ed.she/her/hersTheatre DirectorThespian Troupe Director (Troupe 8201)NHS AdviserDesi Union Adviser Milpitas High School

Kaila Schwartz

Contact Details