Summit Academy – Dayton teacher Katherine Spain has literally and figuratively set the stage for student creativity and growth with the school’s new Theatre Club. The club’s roughly 15 active members speak to its demand, says Spain, a passionate thespian with a BA in Theatre from the College of Charleston.
“When I started to bring drama into my ELA classroom, the reaction was positive enough to encourage me to start a club,” Spain says, “For the kids, I think the performing arts are an undervalued way of teaching students how to communicate and build skills that will serve them as they work toward living life as fully functional adults after graduation, whether that be in college, trade school or straight to employment.”
The club members are currently working on a December 19 Christmas Pageant show. The performance will combine scenes from “Nightmare Before Christmas,” “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York,” “Elf” and “A Christmas Carol,” among others, with holiday songs featured in between.
Spain says the high schoolers in the club are dedicated to honing their acting chops, and it shows.
“They are really developing their skills, and I’m impressed in the strides they have made toward success. They’re becoming better performers and working as a community toward a goal,” says Spain. “Their excitement for more shows and to actually perform is very heartening and they are working very hard toward it.”
The budding young actors are just getting started. Spain says she has at least one more show – if not two – on her wish list for the remainder of the school year and, potentially, a blossoming lifelong love for theater among her students.
“I think that every student, regardless of reading level or socio-economic background or home life, is entitled to participate in art and culture,” Spain says, “and that they can, indeed, be a part of it and it is not inaccessible to them for whatever reason they may think.”