I wanted to do a brief post about the exhaustion that is setting in on me. I have been working on this fellowship for 13 days now. I knew when I left that I would have fun but it was been surprising how much INTENSE work this has been. I have stayed up late almost every night to post on my blog and it has been a great experience. I feel lucky and blessed to have been a part of this all and I will continue to seek out grants and fellowships for the rest of my career because I don't think I have learned this much in such a short period of time EVER in my life. I've seen more shows than I usually see in a few years in the last 2 weeks. I've learned more from my workshops than I know what to do with, and it will take me some time to sort through it all and organize it into cohesive lesson plans during the rest of the summer. I'm so lucky that I get to rest when I get home and not go straight back to work, because I really need some rest right now. I've met folks from all over the country and we've shared all sorts of ideas.
I've met teachers that operate with little to no financial support (similar to my program) and I've also met people with enormous budgets and huge community support. I met one teacher from South Carolina, it is his first year teaching and he just did Les Miserables and they had a $200,000 budget! For ONE show! Now that is support. It is his first year teaching and he is not the primary theatre teacher, but one of 3 at his school. They have supporters from Canada who fly down each year and stay in the community for one week just to see their shows.
When I wake up in the morning my eyes are heavy, but I know I have to get up and have breakfast and get to the workshops and shows so I don't miss out on any learning and absorbing of information. My body is starting to ache and sitting in the uncomfortable seats of a theatre reminds me that it is my DUTY to produce compelling work for my audiences. If I do NOT do that, why would they want to come and sit in the uncomfortable chairs of our intimate black box theatre, or even worse, why would they want to come and sit on high school lunchroom table chairs to see our kids perform? If they are coming to see us, spending money and their time, we better be knocking out of the park.
Seeing all these talented students from across the country has been super inspiring. It also makes me know that getting at least 4-5 of my students to this festival next year will become a priority. I hope that we can somehow afford to get them here. Fundraising is not going to do it, because all of our fundraising must go towards our program, but somehow we are going to get some kids here because it is the educational opportunity of a lifetime for these high schoolers.
It's also a great learning tool for educators because all we have to do is network and reach out a little bit and we suddenly have someone that is in our shoes, in another state or even another country, that we can reach out to when we have issues. There is no one else like me at my high school, I'm the only theatre teacher, so this allows me to build up that database of information necessary to grow my program in ways unfathomable by myself.
The travel and the long hour work days are wearing me down, but I've only got one more full day to tackle and then I will return home to my family and loved ones. I'm looking forward to getting home Sunday, but I'm also looking forward to one more day of education. I cannot thank the people at Fund For Teachers enough. Fund For Teachers is the organization that paid for all my travel expenses and my entire week of learning in Chicago. I also owe a great deal of thanks to the folks at the Alabama Thespian State Festival who helped me secure my theatre director's scholarship to attend this conference and learn so much valuable information.
It goes to show that although the work is non-stop, the payoff will be incredible and students will benefit from this education that I'm gaining for years to come.
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