The pandemic forced a Milwaukee theater company to go virtual. Now its students with disabilities are thriving.
Author: Amy Schwabe
Schwabe, Amy, The pandemic forced a Milwaukee theater company to go virtual. Now its students with disabilities are thriving, June 8th 2020
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While Katie Cummings was academy director at First Stage children's theater for 7 years, she helped lead the Next Steps program, which provided acting classes for children with autism and other sensory processing disorders.
Two years ago, she started her own theater company, Pink Theater, partly because she realized people with special needs wanted acting opportunities when they grew up.
Now people as young as 4 years old who identify with a disability can take classes in acting, musical theater and puppetry at Pink Umbrella.
Cummings does most of the theater company's administrative work out of her living room. Classes and productions have been held at Gigi's Playhouse, Luther Manor, the Jewish Community Center, Crossroads Presbyterian and Plymouth UCC. Cummings was in the middle of discussions with a local theater to host a performance in September.
Then COVID-19 happened, and all of Pink Umbrella's endeavors went virtual. "I'd rather have everybody be safe than do a play," said Cummings.
For the past two months, students have been able to take coaching sessions and classes through Zoom. Cummings has decided to expand the course offerings but keep the platform virtual all summer.
As the world has been looking for silver linings since the pandemic started, the changes Cummings and her staff made at Pink Umbrella have turned out to be much more than just making the best of a bad situation. For many students, the need to go virtual has made the experience better.
- Students who have autism and other sensory sensitivities love doing their classes from their own homes where they're more comfortable.
- Students who have physical disabilities love that they don't have to worry about transportation to and from classes.
- Previous teachers who have moved to other cities love that they can "come back" to teach their students.
"We're finding that a lot of our students are more open to trying new experiences when they're in their own homes," said Cummings. "Being all virtual can put up barriers for some people, but for a lot of our students, it's really breaking down those walls."
Clayton Mortl has taken acting classes in person at Pink Umbrella before, but he stopped when they proved too overwhelming for his sensory sensitivities.
Clayton, who is 23 now, acted in school plays throughout middle and high school, and has been involved in community theater since graduating from high school.
"I'd had a string of unsuccessful auditions and I was beating myself up wondering what I was doing wrong," said Clayton.
When his mom, Beth Mortl, heard Pink Umbrella's classes had gone virtual, she suggested Clayton try again. He signed up for two one-on-one coaching classes, one to help him prepare for monologue reading and one that's focused on musical theater.
"I was upfront with the teachers," said Clayton. "I told them I wanted to work on strengthening my audition game, to make sure I'm doing it right."
Clayton said his teachers have been supportive and helpful in guiding him. "I feel like I get to experience professional training from the comfort of my own home," he said.
Beth said the online classes are exactly the type of thing that should be done for people with autism. She said caretakers for people with autism are taught to provide "scaffolding" — to break down every activity into smaller pieces so the person can get comfortable with that piece, then have something to build on until they're comfortable with the entire activity.
"During his musical theater class, I hear Clay doing things like voice prep and mouth exercises," Beth said. "These are things he was unable to do before because it was overwhelming for him to be at those in-person classes. But now he's able to practice these skills, and when the world reopens, he'll have these experiences to back him up and get back into stuff."
Brenna Kempf, a teaching artist at Pink Umbrella, has also noticed the increased confidence of her students since the classes have gone online.
She described one student who was always happy to contribute her thoughts during in-person classes, and noted how her contributions have changed — for the better — in recent months.
"Sometimes her answers would closely mirror or reflect those of her peers when we were in-person," said Kempf. "Online, she has opened up, and she suddenly has this confidence to say exactly what she feels. Her ideas are just pouring forward, and it's just incredible to see."
Kempf has also noticed how her students' independence has grown as a result of the virtual setting. When the students are in their own homes, parents and caregivers are comfortable enough to let them be on their own in the room during their classes — a level of independence they don't often have.
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