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I n c i t e /I ns i ght
W i n te r 20 1 9
Theatre, Education, and Culture
on the Island | Performing Arts at
Hawaii’s Parker School
WR ITTEN BY
ANGELA DEE KŪLIAIKANU’U ALFORQUE
The cast of Parker School Dramatiques’ A Chorus Line
A Campus on an Island
1) “You are very ambitious” Our 23-acre campus, established in 1976, sits in a
historic ranching community, and our 250-seat
theatre-and-classroom dates back to World War
II when it served as a United Service Organizations
entertainment hall for United States Marines.
2) “ Wow, I didn’t know my child (or that student)
could______________________________________ !
(sing/dance/act/choreograph/run lights
and sound/design sets and costumes/
run a box office)” I moved here from Sacramento, California in 2012
to succeed the founding director of the K-12 drama
and music program, Maren Oom Galarpe—who left
to teach in Southern California, and with whom I
have gladly reconnected through AATE.
3) “It all comes together just like magic,
doesn’t it?” My colleague, Sara Jane Lilley, joined the faculty
in 2013 and we have continued to develop the
performing arts program. Sara Jane and I have
the privilege of a truly respectful and collaborative
partnership which allows us to create and teach
electives including acting, dance, chorus, technical
theatre, performance studies, play production, and
our after-school theatre program, Dramatiques.
The feedback I receive most often regarding
our productions and classes are:
A
mbitious, yes; magical, certainly. Our
Town, In The Heights, Twelfth Night,
Aladdin, Jr., Cinderella, Medea, Comic
Book Artist, Footloose, The Madwoman
of Chaillot, The Little Mermaid, Jr., Aida,
Dorothy In Wonderland, Mother Courage and
Her Children, Annie, Jr., A Chorus Line, Much Ado
About Nothing; Broadway’s Best Musical Revue,
and annual showcases, concerts, and charity
fundraisers: these are among the productions
spanning my seven years as Director of Performing
Arts at Parker School in Waimea (Kamuela), Hawai`i.
We have a relatively comprehensive program
for any college-prep independent school but
especially so given our small size (around 320
students from kindergarten through 12th grade)
and our small town (about 10,000 people in the rural
uplands of the Hawai`i Island. This is also known as
the Big Island).
Our ambition as teaching artists is inspired by a
shared desire to nurture students’ curiosity and
talent towards skill, self-realization, and joy. We want
them to aspire to the extraordinary, imaginative,
and delightful. We practice discipline, resilience,
and focused study in reciprocity with creativity,
energy, and self-expression. We as a whole learning
community must use all of these elements in our
work, especially because of our geographically
isolated location with occasional school
interruptions due to hurricane warnings and lava
flow-related earthquakes. When even food supplies
are sometimes understocked in the grocery