Hartnell College theater students to perform in paradise.

Theater students at Hartnell College want to go to Hawaii. Not just for the surf and sun and ukulele music, but for the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival. It’s a national theater program that corralls 20,000 students and 700 academic institutions meeting in eight different regional hubs. One hub will be the University of Hawai’i at Manoa and Chaminade University of Honolulu this Feb. 11-14.

What will students do there? Attend workshops, compete for scholarships, listen to symposiums, network with others, receive awards and get better at theater. Hartnell students would be doing all of the above, and, additionally, perform their adaptation of Aristophanes’ The Birds.

Marnie J. Glazier, theater arts faculty lead, wants to create a streamlined pathway from high schools like Millennium Charter School, through Hartnell College, to CSU Monterey Bay, to employment beyond. She says it’s important to foster more opportunities for people of color in the performing arts and film, where Glazier says theater students are more likely to find work.

“There’s a lack of representation in Hollywood,” Glazier says, “like the recent pushback against the Oscars being so incredibly white again.”

She says KCACTF would help. Hartnell College, like CSU Monterey Bay, is an HSI (Hispanic Serving Institution), while KCACTF has the resources and audience that can help them develop.

Glazier says it’s a challenge for students and their families to fund the trips, so a GoFundMe page has been set up to raise needed money. It can be found by searching “Send The Birds to Hawaii” at www.GoFundMe.com. Aristophanes’ play has provided the wings for the students to fly to Hawaii and join their compatriots. They just need seed money.

Help fund the trip at www.gofundme.com/bw5e9z8s.