My name is Raina Ames. I am a New Hampshire Chapter Founding Board Member, and I have been the Northeast Festival Host for the last two years. I also am the Director of Theatre Education at the University of New Hampshire. Though I don’t teach high school now (I did in the 1990’s and was the Thespian Troupe sponsor for Macomb Junior/Senior High School in Illinois), my students are aspiring theatre teachers who wish to work with K-12 students. Currently I believe the University of New Hampshire is the only university in the state which offers a theatre education program. I believe attending Arts Advocacy Day would be very important, not only to strengthen my ability to function as a chapter board member but also as one of the few higher education professors in New Hampshire who is advocating for teacher-training programs in theatre education. Especially now, the arts seem to be in a unique predicament with a new administration and the talk of cutting the NEA, so I would like to strengthen both my connections to other arts advocates across the country as well as with NH legislators.
New Hampshire’s K-12 schools already face an uphill battle as there are very few that have theatre as at least one class during the day. There are also approximately twenty teachers in the state who are certified in Theatre Arts. While there is research proving the benefits of creative drama and theatre for K-12 students, it seems like theatre and dance are the forgotten arts subjects in New Hampshire schools. Often I have seen conferences offering “arts advocacy” workshops, but visual art and music are the two art forms discussed. Theatre has the ability to bring together the skills from visual art, music, dance and drama as an integrated way of incorporating all art forms. I feel it is vital to become a better advocate, but I lack the specific knowledge about current research along with specific advocacy strategies to be as effective as I could be in my state.
For those high school students I serve as a chapter board member, I believe my experience at Arts Advocacy Day would help me more effectively propose programming for our festivals. For the college students I teach, I believe that clarifying my understanding of effective arts advocacy will help me prepare them to be better advocates as they start their teaching careers. I believe that as one of the few people in NH higher education who teaches theatre education, this experience would prepare me to proactively find ways to better position theatre education in the state. Networking with state legislators will also likely provide a better understanding of how I can take advantage of opportunities and support already offered in New Hampshire.
My students last semester created and implemented a unified arts program for middle school special needs students. There had never been a drama opportunity offered for these students, but they enthusiastically jumped in to learn drama activities and to produce their own play. The sense of pride for both the middle schoolers and my college students was extremely heartwarming, but it seems we often have to fight to bring theatre to K-12 students as an internship opportunity. Personally, I believe that because mine is the only theatre education program in the state, I can get very discouraged, like I’m constantly pushing a boulder uphill. I need to be rejuvenated and find the initial love I had for theatre so that I can strengthen my ability to advocate successfully for theatre arts education in my state. I believe attending the Arts Advocacy Day would be the spark I need to help work more effectively for my field and for the students in New Hampshire who are directly impacted by the presence or absence of theatre in their academic lives.
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Raina Ames
Associate Professor/Director of Theatre Ed.
Durham NH
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