Theatre Program Requirements

Faculty

• Jared Larkin
• Spencer Potter (Co-Chair)
• Stephanie Stroud (Co-Chair)

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Mission

The mission of the Department of Theatre at Westminster University is to use the University’s core values to frame the way theatre work is conceived and practiced:

• Impassioned teaching and learning
• Respect for diversity
• Collaboration and teamwork
• Personal and social responsibility
• High ethical standards

The Department of Theatre members is dedicated to creating the academic and artistic contexts that help students: 1) master various aspects of theatrical work (i.e., design, directing, dramaturgy, new work development, and performance); 2) investigate how theatre, culture, and community have intersected, are linked in the present, and could be connected in the future; and, 3) cultivate healthy habits that facilitate powerful theatre work.

Program Goals

• Students will demonstrate the skills needed to produce creative, expressive, and distinctive work—on the page, on-stage, and backstage.
• Students will model the leadership skills necessary to facilitate the collaborative, ensemble environment that is the hallmark of great theatre.
• Students will demonstrate the ability to think, write, and speak self-reflectively, analytically and fluently, about their own and other’s work.
• Students will examine their personal, social, and global understanding through engagement in an intentionally diverse array of theatre work—on campus, in site-specific settings, and in community contexts.
• Students will explore the connection between physical, mental, and emotional health and successful theatre work.

Degree Outcomes

• Performance BFAs select and prepare appropriate repertoire to market themselves, audition for future theatre work, and/or successfully pursue graduate studies.
• Technical theatre BFAs will design and produce effective portfolios that showcase their knowledge, skills, and personal qualities and help them secure future theatre work and/or successfully pursue graduate studies.
• BA theatre majors will demonstrate the core artistic and academic competencies that inform all theatre studies and incorporate the knowledge, skills, and personal qualities of focused theatre work in their choice of career paths.
• All theatre students will appreciate the value of authentic inquiry, the need for risk taking, and the lifelong skills of effective self-evaluation, active listening, spontaneous generosity, and insatiable curiosity.

Objectives

The Theatre program offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) degree with emphases in performance and technical theatre. It also offers a generalist Theatre major (BA) and a Theatre minor. Our programs prepare students for entry into the professional theatre, graduate studies, educational theatre, applied theatre and a wide array of other fields wherein theatre intersects with various arts, business, and industry. All degree programs are designed to provide students with practical production experience in order to enable their unique creative expression in the theatre. To this end, students will gain a broad understanding of theatre history, theory, and practice and they will, depending on their chosen emphasis, train rigorously in specific areas such as auditioning, acting technique, stage lighting, costuming, management, and design.

Program Requirements

Students must maintain a minimum 2.5 GPA in courses required for the major and/or minor. With the approval of the instructor, students may repeat specified courses for additional credit.

Students must meet the university-wide graduation requirements in addition to the Theatre major:

• 124 total hours
• 30 upper division hours
• WCore or Honors College requirements

Advising note: students pursuing only the BA will need to take additional elective credits within or outside of the major in order to reach the university wide graduation requirements of 124 Total hours and 30 upper division hours.

Ensemble Requirement: All theatre majors are expected to participate in departmental productions as performers, designers, and/or technicians. To fulfill this requirement. Students must take at east 1 cr. each year of THTR 328 for a role or assignment they fulfill during the year. The department makes its best effort to ensure an equitable distribution of roles and assignments, however, students may need to take an assignment or role that isn’t their first preference e.g. in the rare occasion a student might not be cast, they can fulfill the THTR 328 requirement by serving on the run crew of a production.

Bachelor of Arts in Theatre Degree (BA)

The bachelor of arts in theatre is a generalist degree which explores a wide range of studies in performance, production, and design, allowing students to incorporate the knowledge, skills, and personal qualities acquired in their chosen career path. There is no audition/interview requirement for this track; students declare the major. The bachelor of arts degree does not have any emphases. Students will take courses covering the core artistic and academic competencies that inform all theatre studies and will choose some elective courses based on their interests.

Recommended Plan of Study for BA Theatre

Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre with Acting Emphasis

Enrollment restricted to admitted BFA Acting Students.

BFA program requirements must be completed in addition to the BA Theatre requirements.

Students may declare an area of emphasis and apply for acceptance into the Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre program in the spring of their sophomore year. For the Technical Theatre emphasis, students must submit a portfolio; for the Performance emphasis, students must audition. The portfolio/audition should contain examples of work that the student has produced while at Westminster University. The application is due to the program chair by February 15. The BFA admissions committee will review the portfolios/auditions and notify students prior to registration for the Fall Semester. Students who are not accepted may continue working as academic majors and reapply the following year. Transfer students will apply in their second semester and follow the same process for acceptance to the BFA track, except that the portfolio may contain work produced while studying at other institutions of higher education.

Recommended Plan of Study for BFA Theatre with Acting Emphasis

Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre with Production and Design Emphasis

Enrollment restricted to admitted BFA Production and Design Students.

BFA program requirements must be completed in addition to the BA Theatre requirements.

Recommended Plan of Study for BFA in Theatre with Production and Design Emphasis

Theatre Arts Minor

Recommended Plan of Study for Theatre Arts Minor

Musical Theatre Minor

Recommended Plan of Study for Musical Theatre Minor