Connecting with the ARTS

By: STO Gabriel Brock, Goose Creek Memorial High School, Troupe 8132; STO Talya Hammerman Ridge Point High School, Troupe 7678; STO Folarin Oyeleye Foster High school Troupe 7961

We have reached the final week for Theatre In Our Schools Month! While the moment may be bitter-sweet, seeing as we are coming to a close on the month, hopefully, you’ve enjoyed these past three weeks advertising, reaching out, and teaching. This week, we’re focusing on social media and its relationship to theatre. Social Media is an ever-important aspect of theatre culture, and it ties in the other three points of ARTS:

Advertising 

• Provides more ways of advertising your shows and troupe events
• Interactive and always to a diverse audience
• Advocate at the personal, troupe, school, and even state/national levels.
• Showcases theatre to the new generation of young thespians

Reaching Out

• Provides thespians with an outlet with other thespians and troupes and building a local theatre network
• It makes communicating with representatives, legislators, theatre professionals, and others involved in the arts easier.
• A great way of advocating to a broader audience
• It is interactive; you can comment on/support other troupes, connect with local troupes/alumni, and so much more!

Teaching

• It helps provide a wider spread of educational resources (such as articles or anecdotes from industry professionals) to those who may not have access to them locally.
• Create and share not only theatre educational videos but recordings of monologues, scenes from plays/musicals.
• Diversifies the education thespians receive by exposing them to multiple ideas, stories, circumstances, etc.
• Social media has created an outlet for the arts to be better distributed, allowing students to learn more about the arts from younger ages, allowing them to develop their potential.  

Challenges

• Utilize social media and the skills you’ve learned over the past month and complete these four challenges;

• Post 5 emojis that describe your current show on your social media story and see who can guess it right! 
• Repost graphics promoting shows happening in your community. If no performances are happening at the moment, you can repost anything theatre-related.
• Comment on five theatre socials media pages (Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, etc.)
• Create a Graphic for your troupe and share it with us by tagging @TexasThespians on on any platform.

    
Have a phenomenal rest of your Theatre In Our Schools Month, and continue to use the skills you’ve learned over the past three weeks throughout the rest of the school. Hope to see you all again next year!

Sincerely,
Your 2020 & 2021 Texas State Thespian Officers