What the Drama Farm stands for?

[Derrick Kwa]

Since this place has been quite quiet, I thought I'd try to get a conversation started.

This is a question I recently asked Sarah, and I think she would be glad to get your thoughts as well.

"If you could sum up what the Drama Farm stands for in one word/phrase, what would it be? And why?"

And maybe as an extension of that, how do you think that those principles/ideas (whatever they may be), can be applied in other fields of education?

[andrea shockling]

authenticity.

right? it's an opportunity for authentic, flexible, individualized learning away from a formal learning environment (school) and instead relying on the hands-on, open-ended experiences of an informal learning environment (cultural organizations).

this isn't a new educational philosophy, it's just not one that is being successfully offered to many students, especially at the higher ed level. that's what makes this project so exciting!

[Sarah Deutsch]

Hmmm - I like that. I never thought about it as "authentic" before, but you're right - one of the most important things (in my mind) is that the students can experience what working in the "real world" will be like, but without giving up the learning environment. And there's definitely something more authentic about an education that's being tailored specifically to you, rather than a more generic curriculum that's being applied to dozens of different people.

Do you know of any specific programs where this sort of thing is being offered to students? I'd love to find out more about them, since I haven't come across any in my research...

Thanks! =)

[andrea shockling]

have you looked at the corporate model? like what they do at intel, for example?

also, the MAM progam at the Heinz School has an apprenticeship system that basically places students with cultural organizations - locally and nationally - to work and learn for a semester without classes.

neither of those are quite what you're looking to do, because they are more about the individual working in a larger professional setting, where the drama farm (as i understand it) brings students together for the joint experience. in a way (and bear with me on this...) it's almost like growing theater at the higher ed level.

we recently received a grant from the heinz endowments that was given out by their youth philanthropy program - they accept interns who then work together to learn about the world of foundations, generate an RFP, accept proposals, and then award a series of grants (in this case, for public art). that's getting a little closer to the shared learning experience outside of the classroom i think you're aiming for, right?

let me think on this some more. i have a suspicion that there IS a program out there that is doing something similar, although it might not be in the arts at all. perhaps something in publishing? i don't know...but i'll poke around and see if i can come up with anything more concrete in the meantime. this is hugely related to alot of other things i'm working on that fall under the general category of informal education.

[Sarah Deutsch]

I think you're absolutely right - it is a lot like growing theater for higher education. The basic idea is coming together, collaborating as a group, and learning from that collaboration (which, as I understand it is the point of growing theater too). No reason that the same principles that work for little kids can't work for college kids too...

I hadn't heard about Intel's internships, but it does look similar - at least in the way that it integrates into the student's education. Publishing made me think - have you heard about Project M at all? Good Magazine did an article about it a while back - here it is. They're the closest thing I've found to the same model as the Drama Farm - basically throwing a bunch of college students together with a specific goal, and letting them have at it. There's not a lot of information available about it online - writing to John Bielenberg to find out more is on my list of things to do...

I did know about the MAM apprenticeship program - I'd actually been thinking about talking to Dan Martin to see whether we could get a student to help us out once we're in Pittsburgh. It's not exactly like what they usually do, but it might be an interesting experience for someone to help get an organization up and running - and I sure wouldn't turn away the expertise of someone from the Heinz school.

Thanks for all the leads - the youth philanthropy program sounds really interesting - I'll have to look into that some more too... Let me know if you think of anything else!

What else are you working on? I'd love to hear about it... =)