Theatre for Youth Newsletter
Who's Who
Theatre for Youth MFA Candidates
Steve Barker, a third year MFA, teems with excitement to be interning at Orlando Repertory Theatre, the premier TYA theatre of Central Florida. Prior to grad school, he survived five years as a public high school theatre teacher in the DC/Northern Virginia area after graduating from Virginia Commonwealth University with his BFA in Theatre Education and his BS in Chemistry (long story). Steve's work focuses on both technical theatre education with youth and continuing education for practicing theatre teachers. In the summer of 2008, he implemented his applied project which is a study in the practice of assessment-based technical theatre curriculum in stage lighting. He also presented three times at the 2008 AATE conference in Atlanta this summer.
Kevin Briancesco is a first year MFA in Theatre For Youth, originally hailing from San Francisco, CA. Kevin moved to Arizona two years ago fully intending to either fight pirates or become a professional picture drawer of robots and unicorns. When neither panned out, he decided to earn his MA in Communication Studies at ASU and has presented his research at numerous national communication conferences (with his paper, "The Glamorization of Marginalization," named a top-4 debut paper at the 2007 Western State Communication Association's annual conference).
In 2006, he graduated from San Francisco State University, receiving his BA in Communication Studies with an emphasis in Performance Studies and Gender in Communication.
Outside of academia, Kevin is an active performance poet/activist and has been published in several poetry journals, with writing ranging from his experiences working with children to a poem about how Samuel L. Jackson saved Xmas. Kevin has been a member of three national poetry slam teams, was named the 2006 Mesa Individual Poetry Slam Champion, the 2007 Mesa/Phoenix poetry grand slam champion, currently has three self-published books of poetry.
Zosia Cassie is back in the game for the second year of her M.F.A. in Theatre for Youth. Along with taking her wonderful M.F.A. courses, she is also earning her teacher certification through the College of Education at ASU, so she can bring drama and theatre to the classroom as well as the community. Zosia holds a B.A. in Theatre and History from the University of British Columbia, in her hometown (Zosia is Canadian!) of Vancouver, British Columbia. This summer Zosia facilitated an array of theatre classes and assistant directed two shows at Appel Farm Summer Arts Camp in New Jersey. While there, she put her newly realized beliefs about practicing art into practice with amazing results. Back at ASU, she is teaching Improvisation with Youth and doing improvisation and theatre.
Rachel Hamilton is gearing up for what looks to be an amazing first year in the M.F.A. Theatre for Youth program at ASU. Hailing from all the way from Tucson, where she got her B.F.A. in Theatre Production, B.A. in Journalism and a certificate from culinary school, the move to Tempe was quite drastic. Aside from her culinary and journalistic pursuits, Rachel found her true passion was for theatre for youth whilst teaching drama in many different capacities: to a variety of youth for Arizona Theatre Company, Arts for All, and SharMoore Children's Productions. She is fascinated with facilitating young people's creative imaginations and watching them grow and learn through drama, as she did herself as a child.
Margaret Hoppe is excited to be in the second year of the MFA program in Theatre for Youth here at ASU. She had an exciting summer working with the current (and future) students at Isador Newman School in New Orleans by facilitating "Art and Drama" and "Creative Drama" camps. This year Margaret embarks on the exciting challenges of teaching Improvisation with Youth and facilitating the Digital Storytelling Project at Phoenix Children's Hospital. She also patiently awaits an opportunity to develop the sewing skills her Grandmother taught her this summer.
Mariah Conover Keko is a third-year MFA candidate. She is originally from Minnesota and earned her BFA in Theatre Education from Drake University in 2001. Her primary interest in Theatre for Youth is educationally-driven, and she has taught ages 3-94 in areas such as acting, directing, puppetry and improvisation in addition to public school English, ELL, and speech/communications. During the fall semester of 2008, Mariah is interning with Adventure Stage Chicago, as well as teaching with the Chicago-based Theatre-in-Education company Barrel of Monkeys as apart of her research towards her applied project. This rolling stone will miss her ASU community while busily completing her degree and making Illinois the fifth state where she's held an address.
Anne Negri is a second year MFA student from Kenosha, Wisconsin. She earned her BA in Theatre and French from Ripon College in Ripon, WI and went on to receive a K-12 Wisconsin teaching license in both subjects. Anne spent a school year with elementary-aged students as an English-language teaching assistant in Le Havre, France. After her time abroad, Anne returned to Wisconsin and worked as a part-time substitute teacher in the public schools and as a part-time education intern at First Stage Children's Theater in Milwaukee, WI. This past summer, Anne attended the ASSITEJ World Congress and Festival in Adelaide, Australia. She also taught summer drama classes for Greasepaint Youtheatre, Phoenix Theatre, and ASU's Herberger Institute for Kids. This semester Anne is teaching two Puppetry with Children courses. She is looking forward to pursuing her growing interest in TYA new play development, dramaturgy, and attending the Bonderman Symposium in March!
Tifani Pust, a third year MFA, still loves calling Arizona home and has adapted to life in Tempe well. Previously, Tifani was sighted teaching a large theatre program in the west valley at Apollo High School in Glendale. She definitely enjoys working with teens & "tweens." Tifani received her post baccalaureate teacher certification from Rio Salado in 2003, after obtaining her Theatre BA Cum Laude from ASU in 2001. In between school stints, she worked full-time and started the small but proud Theatre Next. Over the last 15 years, Tifani has been and is a producer, director, actor, teacher, writer and overall lover of the arts as a whole. Tifani has worked with various theatre companies in the Valley and also in Greeley, CO and Flagstaff, AZ.
Aimee S. Reid, a first year MFA, is very excited to be joining the ranks of ASU's Theatre for Youth graduate students after recently graduating from Bowling Green State University with her undergraduate theatre degree. Hailing from good ol' Ohio, she has directed for, taught at, and acted all over NW Ohio, including with Children's Theatre Workshop, Horizon Youth Theatre, Beautiful Kids Independent Shakespeare Company, Still Waiting Productions, and numerous schools. Aimee believes in the value of play, creativity and stretching beyond expectation, all of which she strives to promote in her theatrical endeavors. She is honored to be working with such a wide array of talented people and is excited to learn from them as well as from the numerous experiences waiting for her at ASU.
Sarah Sullivan is a first year MFA candidate and a graduate of Northwestern University's theatre program. She is a teaching artist from Chicago, where she taught for Dewey Elementary School, Fairview Elementary School, About Face Youth Theatre and Northlight Theatre, where she directed the 2007 Young Playwrights Festival. She also worked as a children's librarian in the Evanston Public Library. She is thrilled to be at ASU!
Xanthia Angel Walker is excited to be in her second year of the MFA program. She earned a BA in Theatre Arts and a BA in Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies from the University of Minnesota. Ms. Walker is passionate about the intersection of theatre and social justice, and loves creating community-based theatre with youth. This past summer, she spent the month of May in Australia as one of two U.S. Interns at the ASSITEJ World Congress and Festival. Upon her return, she worked as Assistant Director of Free Arts Arizona's summer theatre intensive, creating a performance with high school students who are currently residing in group homes and the foster system. Ms. Walker also worked with Phoenix Theatre as a teaching artist for the Adventure Stage, a pilot program using theatre as a medium for skills-based work with youth on the Autism Spectrum. In July, she was a student at the Cornerstone Institute with Cornerstone Theater Company in Los Angeles. She will spend this school year as artist in residence at the Tumbleweed Center for Youth Development, and as the instructor of Theatre for Social Change.
Blake Wilson is a 3rd year MFA student in the Theatre for Youth program. A native of Atlanta, GA, Blake has worked as a director, stage manager, teaching artist, and full-time classroom teacher. Blake's interests include community-based theatre, directing, new play development, education reform, and making theatre accessible to all young people and communities who wish to participate. Since arriving in Arizona, Blake has worked with Free Arts Arizona and Greasepaint Youtheatre. Projects at ASU include working as a co-creator for Txt Me a Story, a touring play, and Clock Without Hands, an original theatre piece, and serving as assistant director for ASU's mainstage production of The Lost Ones. Last fall he directed PRISM Theatre's production of The Life and Times of Tulsa Lovechild. He is currently working on his applied project, for which he will be a collaborator with A. Beck (ASU alum), QSpeak Theatre, The Tempe Historical Museum, and playwright Laurie Brooks in adapting oral histories from the Phoenix LGBT community for possible use in an intergenerational play about Phoenix's LGBT community.
Theatre for Youth PhD Candidates
Sara M. Baraldi graduated from the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) where she completed her B.A. in Theatre Education, and has an M.A. degree in Educational Theatre from New York University (NYU). While completing both degrees, she initiated training in mask-making and puppetry performance with MaskHunt, Inc. Currently in the Ph.D. program in Theatre for Young Audiences (TYA) at ASU, she is still involved in mask and puppetry work, she aspires to become a scholar in the field of TYA and to teach theatre and related subjects to all age/grade levels. Her current research focuses on exploring ways in which drama and theatre techniques create environments that aid English Language Learners acquire and use the English language in the elementary classroom.
Sean J. Bliznik (2nd Year Ph.D. TFY): Originally from New England, Sean is a recent transplant to Arizona from Celebration, Florida where he completed his master's degree in theatre at the University of Central Florida. Sean has performed and directed professionally in New England, Florida, and Arizona. While at ASU, Sean presented a paper entitled "All That's [Not] Known": The Sexual Education of the Teenager through Spring Awakening at the Comparative Drama Conference in Los Angeles; attended ASTR in Phoenix; "New Visions, New Voices" in Washington, D.C.; and the ASSITEJ International Conference in Adelaide Australia. Sean's research interests including exploring the representation of gender roles in theatre for young audiences and exploring musical theatre through the lens of the teenage angst musical.
Dena Davis Freed is a PhD candidate in Theatre for Youth at Arizona State University, currently working on her dissertation which studies using Forum Theatre to explore the parable of the Prodigal Son with teens. At ASU, she taught Theatre for Social Change classes and assisted in Dramatic Analysis classes and Introduction to Theatre classes. Dena also holds a Master of Arts in Theatre from the University of North Texas and a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre from Midwestern State University.
Craig Kosnik is entering his second year of work as a PhD student. Craig is following up a busy, busy summer with a busy, busy school year. In May, Craig attended ASSITEJ in Australia and then came back to Tempe to work seven straight weeks of camp through Childsplay and ASU, working with pre-schoolers through high schoolers. Craig also worked part-time in the Child Drama Archives this summer, under the supervision of Kathy Kryzs. He worked on completing sorting over sixty boxes of the Suzan Zeder collection. Craig ended his summer in Erie, PA where he directed Phil Grecian's The Dragon of Nitt with children ages 9-15 as part of the Erie Playhouse's Eighth Annual Summer Play Series. Besides being a teacher and a director, Craig's research interests include teen theatre, identity, and what is considered outside the norm.
Matt Omasta's eclectic background in the performing arts includes work with students from the elementary through graduate levels in various areas of the theatre including drama pedagogy, acting, playwriting, puppetry and dramatic theory / analysis. As a doctoral candidate in Theatre for Youth at Arizona State University, his primary research interests include performance & cognition, drama across the curriculum, and corporate theatre for young audiences. Also at ASU he serves as president of the Arizona Association for Theatre Scholarship & Service and as Assembly President for the Graduate & Professional Student Association. At the national level, he was recently elected to serve on the Executive Committee of the American Society for Theatre Research, where he is also President-elect of the Graduate Student Caucus. He co-chairs the College/University/Research Network of the American Alliance for Theatre & Education, and is an active member of numerous (inter)national theatre & educational associations.
Martin Prows is a theatre scholar specializing in Theatre for Youth. As a first year doctoral student, his research focuses on the relationship between play (imaginative, narrative, transformative and object play) and the theatre. He also concentrates on children's/young adult literatures, adaptation, representation, and devised theatre. Martin holds a Master's Degree in Drama from Washington University and a Bachelor's Degree in Theatre Arts from Brigham Young University. He has an extensive background in training and development, as well as significant work experience with young people, including children with special needs, in both professional and community settings.
YiRen Tsai, a native of Taiwan, enjoys working with and for youth. She received her MFA degree in Drama and Theatre for Youth at the University of Texas at Austin in 2004. She then worked at the First Stage Children's Theatre, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, as their Academy/Education Associate Director from 2004 to 2007. In 2008, she returned to Taiwan and studied under a grand master of the Taiwanese Traditional Glove Puppetry and had a wonderful time. The latest news for her is that she got married in August 2008.