Creative After School Theatre with Donna Park

By Heidi Hood on February 1, 2018 in Arts, Resource Companies

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Welcoming Creative After School Theatre to the School Zone Podcast.

“Cultivating creative thinkers through participation in theatre arts.” – Creative After School Theatre

We are excited to introduce an incredibly fun and creative program that can have lifelong ramifications for your kids. The School Zone Podcast is honored to have Donna Park of Creative After School Theatre on the podcast.

She spent 30 years as a TV producer and director, but a passion for theater and a void in her community lead Donna Park to launch a theater academy in 2008. What began as a plan for a brick and mortar facility offering enrichment programming for students, turned into a campus-based after school enrichment program when Donna was approached by a principal that said, “You should start a drama club at the school”. Since that first request, the traveling after school enrichment programs on campus have been so successful that they are now the only programs that CAST offers.

Once a week, after school, public and charter schools in the Dallas Fort Worth area enjoy the Creative After School academy offerings. Programs introduce students to theater while helping kids learn to overcome stage fright by stressing fun, showing respect…and having fun! Kids learn improv, quick thinking skills, effective communication and focus. As a part of the curriculum, students have the opportunity to audition, rehearse and perform in a full blown play on a professional stage.

The lifelong ramifications of the Creative After School Theatre experience are powerful and can impact kids far beyond the final curtain call. Participants learn valuable life skills like problem solving, how to receive constructive criticism and the art of working together collectively. Watching shy children blossom into leaders over just a couple of years in the program is incredibly rewarding.

Life does not offer us a script but graduates of the Creative After School Theatre program walk away better equipped to navigate each scene by learning how to improvise, effectively communicate, think on a higher level and pivot when things in life don’t go as planned.

Cover of Donna Park's book called Got Drama?