Theatre for Young Audiences
BFA in Theatre Arts with a concentration in Theatre for Young Audiences
About the concentration
Cast and Crew of “Last Stop On Market Street”
2023
In the Theatre for Young Audiences concentration, you’ll receive a comprehensive, intensive training experience that includes academics, studio training and performance internships. You will study to be a performer, education outreach coordinator, director or administrative professional in youth theatre companies.
You will take courses in acting, technical theatre, stage movement, directing, playwriting for youth, theatre for young audiences and voice and articulation.
Students will find themselves performing or working behind the scenes on all kinds of stages, on campus, in the community and across the region. ECU Storybook Theatre performs marquee title productions in ECU’s Wright Performing Arts Center as a part of the College of Fine Arts and Communication’s Arts Smart and Family Fare series, and tours regionally to the Turnage Theatre in Washington and the Two Rivers Theater and Event Center at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point. You will have the opportunity to perform for patients at Vidant Health’s James and Connie Maynard Children’s Hospital. Storybook Theatre holds a host of material in repertory, using live theatre to encourage best literacy practices in elementary schools, at regional festivals and in public libraries.
Our undergraduates will gather source material—folktales from around the world—when they link via satellite with university students studying English in countries including Poland, Egypt, Russia, China, Peru and Japan. They share stories and myths, and translate them into multicultural theatrical productions, such as Peru’s “The Three Shovels” and Japan’s “Peach Boy.”
You’ll complete a formal or informal internship in the community with an organization such as an arts council, public school, library, theatre or children’s theatre.
The concentration provides opportunities to teach in the K-12 ECU Summer Drama Camp. Study abroad options are also available.
Students have toured internationally, receiving international awards for collaboration in Japan and performing at the International Youth Festival in Krosno, Poland.
Student experiences
In addition to outreach and mainstage productions, you’ll build your own path through Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity award projects and participation in student organizations.
Students also engage with guest artists, like puppeteer Steve Myott and Theatre UCF’s Elizabeth Brendel Horn. The Dramatists Guild for Young Audiences, another student-run organization, produces original plays written by students for young audiences.
Rehearsal for
“Cosmic Fruit Bowl” 2022
How do I learn more?
Contact Lisanne Shaffer-Dickerson: shafferl22@ecu.edu 252-328-1196