Randolph College MFA Theatre

01/16/2026

We invite you to watch to our January 2026 Graduation commencement speech, delivered by Andrew Roblyer, Class of Jan 2026.

01/16/2026

11/24/2025

We're almost a third of the way through our Sixty Successes series, and today we're featuring a Lynchburg Local Legend! While most of our students hail from all over the country, a few live just down the road from Randolph, and Erin Foreman is one of them!

Erin is a director, designer, educator, and non-profit administrator who currently serves as the Technical Director at EC Glass High School in Lynchburg, VA. There she designs and builds (with students she oversees) in 4-5 mainstage shows a year

She is also the President of the Mark W. Foreman Foundation for the Performing Arts, a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting community and regional theatre in Central Virginia area. Under her leadership, the Foundation produces monthly calendars of all community performances that are distributed at all 8 local theatres, awards a bi-yearly grant of $1000 to directors of local community theatre productions to help fund their shows, hosts events like the Showtunes Proms to celebrate local regional, community, and educational theatres, and sponsors a weekly radio segment on local theatre in the area.

Erin is also the Program Director of Embark Youth Conservatory, the Youth Theatre camp associated with Endstation Theatre Company at Randolph College each summer. Erin oversees a team of up to 8 educators offering 6 classes a day in various skills, such as dance, improv, acting skills, scenework, Shakespeare, stage combat, and more. Her focus is on teaching life skills through theatre skills with the 3 C's - creativity, communication, and confidence, and focusing on process over product.

Erin is a dual-track design/directing student in our program, having previously been mentored by Jessica Zivny and Ariel Benjamin for her design focus, and this past semester working with Nana Dakin on directing focused work. This semester, she and Nana have been focusing on developing Erin's artistic identity and sustainable practices for the working professional. She is also conducting research on incorporating ASL Interpreting into theatrical productions and enable accessiblity for deaf and hard of hearing audiences, and will be directing her thesis project at Randolph College next May.

Oh, and if all that wasn't enough, Erin is also a **pyrotechnician** during the summer who executes all of the local fireworks shows!

Erin is a prime example of the multi-hyphenate theatre artist that thrives in a flexible, individually-focused program like ours!

11/15/2025

It's day 18 of our Sixty Successes, and today we're highlighting another member of the FOURmidable cohort, Dave Pausch!

Dave is an actor, director, and educator based Madison, WI. This past semester, Dave direct the Wisconsin premiere of the play "Tragedy Sound," written by Karen Saari (who happens to be his wife, portrayed Madison doctor and World War 2 veteran J. Leroy Sims to several hundred students, veterans and the general public as part of the Wisconsin Veterans Museum's annual Talking Spirits event; produced and directed Anne Carson's translation of Antigone at La Follette High School in Madison where he teaches, and taught a Intro to Acting Technique adult enrichment course based off of Adler Technique.

And that's not counting his official MFA work! This semester Dave was mentored by Ginna Hoben and focused on his work as an actor, reading 12+ plays to discuss with her during their meetings, and added 4 new monologues to his audition repertoire.

Dave will be continuing his acting work in the coming weeks, appearing as Colonel Jessup in a staged reading of A Few Good Men by Aaron Sorkin at Madison College. As Dave says, "Now I'm looking forward to semester three in the life-changing Randolph College MFA program!"

In a traditional MFA program, all of the incredible work an artist like Dave is continuing to create in his community wouldn't be possible. But with a low-residency model, he gets the 1:1 support he needs to level up his artistry and continue building community ties at home!

11/12/2025

We're back on track with our Sixty Successes challenge for Day 17, and today we're introducing you to Emily Vallozzi, a member of the FOURmidable! cohort.

Emily is a costume designer and educator currently serving as the Costume Shop Manager and a faculty member at George Washington University in Washington DC. Ricky Ramon, director of the GWU 2023 production of Silent Sky says, "I have worked with many costume designers throughout my career and by far Emily Vallozzi is one of the best I've ever worked with...I would work with her time after time after time."

Recently, Emily's costume design and construction work for GWU's production of Twelfth Night received a wonderful acknowledgement from DC Theatre Arts! (Their website is currently down, so we will update this post with a quote when it is available again)

A traditional MFA program would have meant that Emily would not be able to foster the relationships she has built at GWU in the same way; she would need to pick up her life to move for 2-3 years to the site of her MFA program. Our low-residency model means that she gets 1:1 mentorship from a faculty mentor each semester and can deepen the opportunities and relationships she has already invested time into building!

11/10/2025

On Day 16 of our Sixty Successes challenge, let's meet another member of the 24/7 cohort, graduating in January: Linze Struiksma!

Linze is a director and educator based in Utah; the low-residency model of our program has allowed her to not only keep teaching her students, but involve them in her thesis project! This semester, she led her advanced acting students (highschool seniors) through learning about Theatre of the Oppressed, current cultural awareness, and the acts of devising theatre. She challenged them to choose a topic of oppression they felt is present in their local and state society and dissect its root causes, systemic issues, and different manifestations.

They chose to focus on classism, including internal, health, education, legal, media-focused, etc. They then created a 60 minute devised showcase around this topic filled with monologues, scenes, movement segments, and even songs. They also created pre-show, interactive art installations about classism examples (legal, education, and health) with some calls to action for potential solutions. Linze led a talkback with the audience after the performance, discussing the process and why the students felt it was imperative to talk about. Linze says, "It was beautiful and powerful and has opened up a lot of conversations in our community."

Simultaneously, Linze has been directing Hadestown: Teen Edition and working as an adjunct professor in Theatre Arts Teaching Methods for Westminster University.

11/08/2025

It's day 15 of Sixty Successes, which means we are 1/4 of the way through. That's right, there are still FORTY FIVE more successes from the first two years of our program and first five cohorts of students to share!

Today, we're introducing you to Gina Handy Minyard, a director, educator, and agent! Gina is part of the FOURmidable cohort, which means she just completed her first year in the program, and also just celebrated her first anniversary as an Agent-Manager for EPIC Arts Management.

In August, Gina returned to Miami University (in Oxford, OH) to direct What the Constitution Means to Me by Heidi Schreck. In September, she also returned to Wright State University to direct Concord Floral by Jordan Tannahill. Recently, Gina was selected to Howlround's Justice in the Rehearsal Room cohort, and this December, Gina will be performing in the 5th year of Season's Greetings: A Holiday Cabaret. Gina is also the Founding Artistic Director of Magnolia Theatre Company, which will be the Producer of her thesis project.

11/07/2025

On Day 14 of Sixty Successes, let us introduce another member of the 24/7 cohort that will be graduating in just two short months: Mason Absher!

Mason is currently the Technical Director and Associate Adjunct Professor of Theatre at the University of Indianapolis, where they most recently designed for their spring 2025 production of "Tick, Tick... Boom!" by Jonathan Larson.

Mason is a multi-hyphenate artist and student who is an actor, designer, writer, and educator. This past summer he presented his thesis project, an original one-person show called "The Nite Show! Tonite! Live from Hell!", which blends improvisation and audience interaction with scripted material and Mason's love of the weird and different. He also performed the show as a part of the inaugural Central Virginia Fringe Festival put on by Endstation Theatre (the professional theatre attached to Randolph College) this past summer.

For cohorts that enter the program in a January cohort, the program offers them the chance to do their thesis project in their penultimate semester so that they can take advantage of the venues and resources available during the summer residencies on the Randolph campus. Just another way that we meet students where they are at!

Mason says: "During my time at Randolph I've really been able to up my skills as a writer, actor, designer, and educator. I started at Randolph after coming off of a theatre hiatus due to a broken arm that I had suffered in 2022. I wasn't sure if I'd ever be able to do theatre again, but my community and my mentors (Ginna, Lelund, and Melissa) helped me come back stronger and better than ever. Fly Wildcats Fly!"