by: Nikhila Viswanathan Our 2015 Matthew Stuski Scholarship recipients Faith Jones Jackson, Ming Jiang, and Nikhila Viswanathan, are back in Philly from a week long leadership conference (LEAP) in Los Angeles. We checked in with Nikki to hear about her experience and this is what he had to say...! Our journey began in Philadelphia airport where Ming, Faith, and I checked our bags in and received our tickets to Los Angeles! After a long trip, we were greeted by leap coaches who helped us with our luggage. As we waited for more Leapers in our van to UCLA, the coaches introduced themselves and started dancing to songs in the radio! It was at this moment I thought : "Wow! We already started a dance party as soon as we landed! I can't wait to see what's in store for us on campus!" It was only after the week ended that I realized that I would have new reasons to smile each day: 1. My Group After a great opening ceremony, we split into groups. When I introduced myself, I was timid and spoke softly. My coach, Alex, asked me to speak up and I was worried that the people in my group would judge me for being timid. But I was wrong. Throughout the week, everyone in my group became so close. We all had different traits that set us apart, but made us a great team when we were put together. We had pageant title holders, a chef, an African scholar, a returning leaper, an intelligent scholar, a silly Australian, and a panda lover (ME!). Throughout the week we had each other's backs and always found reasons to smile. My coach Alex selected me as the "BIGGESTleaper" from my group because she saw how invested I was in our group and how much spirit I had. It was my honor to make my group members smile and laugh that week but honestly- they in turn had done something for me: Noelle, John, Auna, Lora, Linda, David, and Alex all gave me a reason to smile!
1 Comment
Each year, Young Playwrights send selected students to a week long leadership conference at UCLA in partnership with The LEAP Foundation, Inc. The conference is designed to teach leadership skills to participating students, aged 15 to 24, in small groups under the guidance of the conference faculty and individual coaches - whereby they will develop fundamental tools that are integral to creating success in their life. This year our Matthew Stuski Scholarship recipients are three current and former PYP Youth Council members: Faith Jones Jackson, Nikhila Viswanathan, and Ming Jiang. One of the components of the conference requires attendees to write a speech that they will deliver in front of an audience. This frightened one of our scholars to the point where he was about to reject the scholarship offer. Meet Ming. A 2015 Young Voices Monologue Festival winning playwright (Who Are You) and recent Chinese immigrant who sought the assistance of PYP staff members to cultivate his speech delivery skills. After rehearsing for three weeks, Ming found his confidence and perseverance to deliver his speech in front of small audience here in our new office. READ MORE for Ming's motivational speech and be sure to check our blog page for updates on LEAP 2015! ALUMNI PROFILE: Emily Acker"Crossing Boundaries" by: Jesse Bernstein EMILY ACKER was a junior in high school and had just returned from living in Israel when she decided to write a drama about a Palestinian boy and an Israeli boy who fall in love. It was her first play. Milk and Honey was a winner in the 2008 Philadelphia Young Playwrights Festival contest. Local theatre artist David Bradley was assigned as dramaturge and director for the a staged reading of the play at Temple University. He took the helm again when PYP later produced a fully-staged, professional production in 2010. As has happened again and again throughout its history, Philadelphia Young Playwrights launched a new voice and created a valuable and on-going collaboration. After high school, Emily attended Northwestern University and spent some time spent in Chicago before returning to Philadelphia to work as a professional playwright. Among other projects, she is a founding member of the playwrights collective Orbiter 3. She also wears many hats for PYP, including being the Literary Manager of the Paula Vogel Mentors Projects and the Programming Director for the PYP Alumni Council. Sometimes, she just likes "to go to [PYP's] offices and hang out. It's not technically squatting if they let you in." David directs at theaters throughout the Philadelphia area and has deepened his involvement with PYP. Most recently, he helped organize and oversee the 1219 Project and this summer he will once again lead a revisions lab. As he says, "I love seeing myself as an ongoing collaborator with Young Playwrights." To say that they're both busy artists with diverse projects in the works is an understatement. However, as the PYPAC found when we caught up with them, the collaboration that began with Milk and Honey is alive and well to this day. As, apparently, are Emily's emails from 2008... PYP alum, Sara Prendergast (CAPA/11th Grade), has received a 2014 National YoungArts Foundation Award in the category of Writing (Play or Script for Film or Video) for her play, Depilatory, which was first produced by Young Playwrights as part of our 2013 New Voices Workshop Productions in collaboration with Temple University.
“From approximately 11,000 applications received, YoungArts has awarded 687 young artists across 46 states. These talented young artists are some of the nation’s best in the Literary, Performing, Visual and Design Arts.” Sara won a Merit-level award which means she receives a Certificate of Achievement, a Recommendation letter for college, and an engraved award for her high school to display. You can see Sara’s name in the list of winners for Pennsylvania on this page. Only 3 of the Pennsylvania winners were from Philadelphia, and Sara is one of them: http://www.youngarts.org/sites/default/files/2014_YAW%20Winners_by%20state.pdf |
Categories
All
|