To The Reader’s Forum:

Several weeks ago several of us from the Chautauqua area community had the pleasure of participating in the Young Playwrights Project (YPP) with over 500 third and fourth graders from eight different schools in the area. This is an amazing program, sponsored by the Chautauqua Institution Arts Education Program. The YPP program brings together students, their teachers, teaching artists from New York City, institution staff, and community volunteers to work with the students to help them develop and write their own plays, then have all 520 plays read back to them. Their classmates ask questions and provide feedback. Students will get to see some of those plays performed on the grounds at Chautauqua in June.

The excitement we witnessed from the students as they heard their plays read, as they received positive reinforcement from their peers, the creativity in the writing, the imaginations that were sparked, the characters that were developed and described, the dialogue that made us laugh and cry – were testaments to the talented students we have in our community.

Watching the talented teaching artists interact with the students, sometimes improvising and creating characters and dialogue on the fly, you could see that these people are actually theater trained actors and educators. And many of the community volunteers had the opportunity to learn and grow ourselves. It was a great privilege to participate in this project and so inspiring to see how the Institution is involved in community education.

The Chautauqua Institution Arts Program provides several unique outreach educational programs in the area. More information is available at https://www.chq.org/category/blog/arts-education/

Terrie Tucker

Chautauqua