Bothell High School to host Oregon Shakespeare Festival actors

Bothell High School will host Oregon Shakespeare Festival actors Omoze Idehenre and Jeremy Thompson on Nov. 10 as part of the Festival’s School Visit Program.

November 4, 2015 9:01 pm

Bothell High School will host Oregon Shakespeare Festival actors Omoze Idehenre and Jeremy Thompson on Nov. 10 as part of the Festival’s School Visit Program. In addition to interactive workshops, the actors will perform excerpts from Shakespeare’s works and other classical and contemporary literature in an assembly setting.

From October through December, teams of actors will tour schools throughout Oregon, Washington, California and Kansas, engaging students from diverse backgrounds through live performances and active workshops.

OSF founder Angus Bowmer created the School Visit Program in 1971 as a way to reach a wider audience and over the past 44 years, OSF has reached over 2 million students in over 7,000 schools in 12 western states. In addition 12 schools from Oregon are part of the School Visit Partnership Program, which provides teachers with professional development and classroom lessons. Actors are also in residence at Partnership schools for two to five days depending on the size of the school.

“Behind the School Visit Program lies the belief that actors, great literature and the imagination of the audience are all the ingredients needed to make captivating theatre,” said Joan Langley, OSF Director of Education. “An essential goal of the program is to provide active and personal involvement in great literature that will excite, inspire and even change the lives of students.”

The 2015 School Visit Program and School Visit Partnership Program are funded by generous grants from The Bowmer Society, the Sharkey Foundation, Joseph R. Parker Foundation, The Lamb-Baldwin Foundation¸ Helen Clay Frick Foundation, Starseed Foundation and also the Oregon Arts Commission.

OSF offers many programs for students including: classes and workshops which introduce and explore the plays for visiting school groups; the Summer Seminar for High School Juniors, a two-week intensive theatre camp for students between their junior and senior year; the Bowmer Project for Student Playgoers, providing support for local teachers through teacher training and curriculum support and free tickets for participating students to designated performances throughout the year.

For more information on this school visit and on OSF educational programs in general, contact Jay Shepherd at 541-482-2111, ext. 414, or jaysh@osfashland.org.