March 2, 2017
At its February meeting in Cincinnati, the Educational Theatre Association Board of Directors passed a resolution to reactivate the Educational Theatre Foundation. While preparatory legal work had been done several years ago, the Board sees this as the most opportune time to have the Foundation become active and act as the fundraising platform for programs that expand access and enhance excellence in theatre education. Plans for the public announcement and launch will be developed.
The Board charged the nominating committee to seek at least four and no more than eight candidates total for the positions of two directors in the upcoming election in September 2017.
The International Thespian Officers, joining the Board to present their report on student leadership, recommended that the national office provide structure and consistency for the selection, training, and leadership development processes for State Thespian Officers.
The Board received updates on the following:
- the Advocacy Leadership Network (ALN) from Director of Educational Policy Jim Palmarini, for which the Board expressed support;
- key chapter statistics related to exciting growth in event participation at the chapter level from Director of Chapters Diane Carr, including qualitative and quantitative measures of success and areas for improvement;
- the status of the revision of the chapter agreement from Executive Director Julie Cohen Theobald and Diane Carr, for which a task force will begin meeting on February 19 to work on revisions and updates;
- an overview of the risk management program from Chief Operating Officer Brian Monk and Greg Deimling and Joan Fitzsimmons of Malecki, Demling, Nielander and Associates, focusing on the most common questions and issues that chapters have, after which Kyle Pohlman of Bartlett & Company reported on the performance of the investment portfolio; and
- a conflict of interest review, wherein no conflicts were found.
In other business:
- Ben Stuart was elected secretary of the Board and a motion was approved to appoint Hunter Bell for a second three-year term; and
- the Board participated in a strategic planning and portfolio analysis exercise assessing current and proposed initiatives in consideration of impact versus investment.
Future meetings will be as follows:
- April 22 via conference call;
- June 21 at the International Thespian Festival in Lincoln, Nebraska;
- July 17-18 at the Annual Leadership Summit in Washington, D.C.;
- September 16 via conference call;
- December 16 via conference call; and
- February 15-17, 2018, in Cincinnati.
