Lights, camera, action! On Feb. 11, 25 Pierce College theater students attended the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival in Mesa, Ariz. The conference was a six-day national theater festival and about 18,000 college students attended.
The purpose of the conference is to help students improve their skills with the assistance of expert critics and mentors. KCACTF aims to provide opportunities by allowing the students to network and encourage more diverse work produced in the theater programs.
“I’m just so grateful for everything that I’ve learned while I was there,” said Alany Soils-Coleman, who was nominated for the Irene Ryan Acting Scholarship and was a runner-up in directing. There’s a sense of community in theater – we really built each other up.”
Nominee for the Irene Ryan Acting Scholarship, Ali Suliman shared what played a key role in helping the Pierce team flourish.
“The community is the most helpful thing, but I think the fact that our scenes were chosen with us in mind helped keep us going, because we were revealing a part of ourselves that we might not normally show, day to day life, and this gave us the opportunity to do that,” Suliman said.
This process encourages students to grow professionally and interpersonally. The KCACTF conference introduces alternative directions for the students to better understand.
Pierce has been participating in the festival for years, but this February, a change occurred. Not only did Pierce compete against its neighboring states but they also had to compete against region seven, which includes Alaska, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Northern California, Northern Nevada, Oregon, Washington and Wyoming.
“Even fiercer, I’ve never seen the competition at this high of a level before,” Theater Professor Shaheen Vaaz said. “[This year was] very rigorous.”
Pierce theater students competed against thousands of more students than usual, but they said that didn’t worry them. Instead of viewing this change as a disadvantage, students saw an opportunity to prosper.
First-year theater major Jacob Garcia won the Heart of the Art for Properties Design award for the play “Clyde’s.” He said a highlight of the festival was interacting with other college theater students.
“I was able to go and see other people’s presentations,” first-year theater major Jacob Garcia said. “See their work, compare it against my own, see what things that they had done differently that I could maybe draw inspiration.”
