A Philadelphia Theatre Summer
At FringeArts, Prado assisted with the preparation for the annual Philadelphia Fringe Festival, coordinating preview nights, artist mixers and events designed to connect Fringe artists with production staff. Prado, who is also a data science and analytics minor, made use of her academic background by writing a program that matched artists with housing and production needs. The work she contributed can be repurposed for future festivals, creating a lasting impact for FringeArts.
At Theatre Horizon, where Nieuwveld and another college student were the first summer interns the organization had hosted, Nieuwveld assisted the development team and learned about the operations of a non-profit theatre. She helped build year-round capacity by creating a grant and reporting calendar, and she even assisted with grant applications. Gilberto Vega (C ’14), Director of External Relations, also wanted to give Nieuwveld and her colleague a fuller sense of the theatre’s producing cycle by assigning them contemporary plays to read and asking them to make a technical, marketing and artistic case for producing them at Theatre Horizon. Since they don’t produce during the summer, Vega said, this was a way to help the interns understand the mindset of what goes into artistic decisions and all the work that flows from that decision. He said a bonus was that discussing plays with the interns indulged his memories of his time studying theatre at Penn.
Both Prado and Nieuwveld also took part in arts education activities during their internships: Prado developed and staffed a tabling activity geared at young people and Nieuwveld sat in on dress rehearsals for Theatre Horizon’s summer camp for teens. Both noted that the variety of work gave them insight into the full range of operations of the organizations, providing a broader perspective than if they’d been at larger companies. Both also saw reflections of their academic and extracurricular involvement in their internships; Prado noted that her administrative tasks felt familiar from her leadership role at Penn Glee Club. Both left their experiences feeling prepared for future leadership at Penn and equipped with a new range of skills that would serve them well in any career path.
