It has become a tradition in our WG Drama Department to attend the MO Thespians Leadership Conference every Sept with the officers in Troupe 191. It's a wonderful opportunity to start the year with new ideas and a fresh perspective, and to get around other troupes to talk shop.
Link to the MO Thespians website: http://www.mo-thespians.com/
This is the itinerary for the weekend's activities and it was pretty packed!
TRAVELING
It takes us about 2 hours get from St Louis to Jeff City and depending on the number of officers that attend, we rent a van if needed. This year we took 5 officers. We listen to music, talk about our season, possible student projects, class projects, ticket swaps with other schools, and we talk about fundraising projects.
This year we had some cookies provided by Mrs. Hennekan, and they were absolutely delicious!
The ride up and back is always fun!
This particular conference is always held in Jefferson City, MO at the Capitol Plaza Hotel. It is right near our State Capital and the scenic views are wonderful.
The hotel is lovely and has plenty of space for the students to teach workshops, attend general sessions and mingle with other student thespian officers from around the state. We also get a discount on the room rates.
Ethan, Sam, Trinity, Elliot, and Conner
The 2016/2017 WG Drama - Troupe 191
Everybody has a job to do,
and this conference can help find better ways to do it!
Our team is strong this year and we're very excited to learn all about the exciting details of the upcoming State Conf and how we can better lead our troupe during the school year.
WG Drama always finds new stuff to try out from this weekend. The officers inevitably bring back new creative fundraising and community service ideas.
The conference offered workshops on a lot of different topics.
Elliot Williams (2017/2018 STO) lead a workshop on how to be a better listener. It was an awesome workshop. He also ran the workshop with the Advanced Drama Class and it went great!
Student Officer Elections
We always encourage our troupe officers to continue the tradition of running for state office. We have had students from WG Drama on the state and national student boards for the last 6 years, It has been a really great opportunity to get involved with a much larger organization and for those students to learn diplomacy and leardership skills. They also help plan the State Conference activities and auction.
Trinity Madison (Troupe 191 Diversity Officer) decided to run for a position on
the State Board this year. She gave a formal speech in front of the whole conference and was great! The students voted and she won! There are 4 total and they are all great kids.
Leadership is always the focus, but we also had meetings that covered the details for IE events, IMPROV team, Tech Challenge and other stuff to help prepare the troupes for various competitions at State. (Which will be back in downtown St Louis this year)
We like the competitions at State and they are a nice way for members of our troupe to challenge themselves in preparing polished work to perform, create designs to present, or to help prep for the various tournament style games.
The 2017/2018 - STOs
It was a very packed two days. We not only were attending the workshops, but our STO - Elliot Williams worked extra hard with his fellow STOs
Elliot is currently on the 2017/2018 Student Officer Board with the MO Chapter and has many responsibilities during the two conferences. Our previous chapter director (Debbie Corbin) is also now on the National EdTA Adult Board which is always nice.
Jacob with the other 2017/18 STOs and Mr. Little (Sponsor) who is in charge
of getting the officers on track with their responsibilities.
of getting the officers on track with their responsibilities.
We are provided with a lunch this year. There is plenty of lemonade and a fabulous dessert. There seems to always someone in our troupe that can eat plenty of leftovers.
Here is part of the troupe finishing up and prep'n for the 2nd half of the day on Sat.
We were encouraged throughout the conference to mingle and get to know other troupes. It was opportunity for the students and teachers to talk about other people's programs and to talk shop. These gatherings are special and allow us to recognize some of the things we may be taking for granted. Our department has a wonderful facility and in talking with other troupes we can quickly see that many schools do their shows in very simple settings.
Friday night is a bit lighter and we ate in the hotel restaurant. Sat morning Mr. Schaefer picked up some stuff from Schnucks like granola bars and OJ.
The last general session is packed full of info. We selected our T-shirt design for State (unfortunately Elliot's design didn't get picked)
THE RIDE HOME
We usually get back on the road around 5:00pm. The ride home is fun and we always have so much to share out about the conference and lots to look forward to in the year ahead. Learning how to be a good leader is tough, and being open to other people's ideas is the first step. This was a wonderful opportunity for Troupe 191 and we look forward to the upcoming State Conference.
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