How theatre education can save the world | Rachel Harry | TEDxMtHood

By its very nature, the theater demands inclusion, cooperation, responsibility, and coming to grips with one’s emotions—even when it’s simply playing a role. “This is powerful medicine for the teenager,” Rachel Harry muses. For Rachel, art requires creativity and the confidence that comes from outside-the-box thinking, even when the results are a few lumps and bruises. For her work teaching teenagers, she recently won the Tony Award for Excellence in Theater Education. Rachel believes teaching should be student-driven and wants students to explore and to reach and to fail, because all of those things — especially failure - will lead to new avenues of learning. She began her career as an English and Theatre teacher at a small high school in Hood River, Oregon. Building on a single introductory-level drama class, she now leads a four-year program in which students can receive both high school and college credit. For her visionary leadership, Rachel Harry was honored with the 2017 Tony Award for Excellence in Theatre Education. Rachel is currently faculty at Hood River Valley High School and Columbia Gorge Community College. She also directs several productions a year, and performs as both an actress and a dancer. Sixteen years ago Rachel founded the Commedia dell’Arte troupe, “Phoenix Theatre” which performs in a wide variety of venues—from farmer’s markets to “The Bite of the Gorge” to the Oregon School Board Association annual convention. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx