Volume 8

Issue 2

Perspectives of Theatre for Young Audience Companies Leaders: A Survey

Matt Omasta

Aubrey Felty

UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY


Abstract

This report offers extensive data from a survey project that invited the artistic, business, and education leaders of every professional Theatre for Young Audiences company affiliated with TYA/USA to share information regarding a wide range of topics including season selection, finances, education programming, staff demographics, leader perceptions of quality TYA, and others. The focus of this piece is a comparison of data from theatres of different types.

Specifically, it considers how three influential circumstances—theatres’ budget sizes, their geographic locations, and their longevity—intersect with, and perhaps affect, other circumstances as well as the perspectives and beliefs of their theatre leaders. This article provides copious descriptive data and invites readers to draw insights from their personal analyses of the data most relevant to their own practice and/or research.


SEE ALSO

Matt Omasta & Aubrey Felty - Data-Based Analysis of Diversity and Equity in Theatre for Young Audience Companies

Author Biographies: Matt Omasta and Aubrey Felty

Matt Omasta is Professor of Theatre Arts and Associate Dean of the Caine College of the Arts at Utah State University. His publications include co-author/editorship of Playwriting and Young Audiences (Intellect), Impacting Theatre Audiences: Methods for Studying Change (Routledge), Qualitative Research: Analyzing Life (SAGE), and Play, Performance, and Identity (Routledge). His articles appear in Youth Theatre Journal, Research in Drama Education: The Journal of Applied Theatre and Performance, Theatre Topics, TYA Today, the International Journal of Education and the Arts, Arts Education Policy Review, Performance Matters, Journal for Learning through the Arts, and others.

Aubrey Felty is a senior from Dallas, Texas pursuing a B.F.A. in Theatre Education and a minor in Family and Human Development at Utah State University. She has presented her work at the American Alliance for Theatre and Education and International Theatre for Young Audiences Research Network conferences. She is a member of the Honors Program and was recognized as the Caine College of the Arts Scholar of the Year in 2020.

Return Links

Cover image from NYU’s Program in Educational Theatre production of Here, All Dwell Free, a virtually produced and pre-recorded musical adaptation of The Handless Maiden, directed in 2021 by Amy Cordileone.

© 2021 New York University