This past weekend I had the incredible pleasure of traveling to two different events back-to-back and experiencing more arts education and theatre culture than I could ever hope for! I left late Friday night to meet up with the fantastic Ms. Diane Carr in Boston in preparation for the Massachusetts State Conference the next day. We arrived at our hotel much later than we intended to and would have a very early morning the next day, so once crashed safely in our rooms, we excitedly anticipated the day ahead! Saturday morning we woke up ready to get to work. We drove over to Wilmington High School, where the Massachusetts State Conference was being held. After being shown around the building and meeting as many people as possible, I headed out into a crowd of students to grab a quick Snapchat video with them and introduce myself! The event then kicked off with one-acts and IEs happening all day long. I meant the fabulous Jess, the State Chapter director for Massachusetts, and had the opportunity to work with her and her students throughout the day. Whether I was timing IEs or ducking in and out of performances, I got to help assist with the execution of some of the boldest pieces of theatre I have ever seen at that conference!
Later that day I had the opportunity to teach my want my leadership workshop to a group of students and I had a fantastic time talking with them all about how they can incorporate leadership into their everyday skill sets. After watching a few more performances and helping out in any way that I could, it was almost time for Ms. Diane and me to wrap up our time in Massachusetts. Before we left, we got to partake in the tabulation of the scores collected from the attending schools to select the Audience Choice Award winner! We were sad to leave the great conference event, and I hope to be coming back again next year. Thank you, Massachusetts Thespians!
After minor difficulties with getting a rental car back to the service and eventually crashing back in our hotel rooms, the next morning we were up and ready to get on our flight to Washington DC! We met up with the fantastic Carly Radebaugh, one of my fellow ITOs, in Detroit, and continued on our way to Washington, where we met up with the rest of the ITOs as well as one of our mentors, the incredible Kimberly Staples. Once there, we had a great brunch at Open City restaurant, and then had the opportunity to meet up with Mr. Jim Palmarini and Mr. Doug Berlon, as well as this year's Democracyworks Essay winner, Salwa Meghjee, along with her twin sister, Samah. Salwa and Samah were lovely to meet, and later that night at dinner I would be pleased to sit and talk with them all about theatre, advocacy, and student leadership. We spent the remainder of our day on Sunday touring around the DC mall area, and I showed the girls the different monuments and museums, of course stopping for a photo shoot along the way! The girls checked visiting the nation's capital off of their bucket lists, and we returned to the hotel that night ready to advocate!
Monday morning we were up early to begin our advocacy training. That morning, not only did we learn many valuable statistics and facts, gain information about the regulation and process of passing laws in the United States government, and understand the different cases being presented to Congress this year, we had the opportunity to hear Salwa read her essay to the entire delegation. Her moving words received a standing ovation from the audience, and if you are interested in hearing her story, you can find the link here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KGgQgAg--8. After a long day of training and workshops, the girls all got ready to go to the Kennedy Center that evening, where we saw a moving performance by Kaki King and listening to an inspiring lecture by John Maeda. Maeda's words drove us all to evaluate how our roll with supporting the arts could have a bigger and more instrumental impact, and gave us all the motivation we needed to go to Congress tomorrow and lobby for the programs we believe in!
Tuesday morning began with a fantastic breakfast at the Senate caucus building, and had us ready to break out to our meetings! All day I was thrilled to work with my PA State Captain, Ms. Jenny Hershour, as she lead our team in advocating for arts education and national funding. I met passionate students and adults from Pennsylvania, who were just as driven to help support these programs, and met with three Congressmen throughout the day. While I had to say goodbye to my gals and mentors early, I had an absolutely incredible time in D. C., and I am so looking forward to next year's Arts Advocacy Day! One more big thank you goes out to Mr. Palmarini, without whom the weekend could not have been so successful. I'm so excited for all that the rest of the year has in store--feel free to follow me at International Thespian Officers on Facebook, internationalthespianofficers on Instagram, @ITOViceChair on Twitter, and ITOOfficial on Snapchat to stay updated with my travels for EDTA!