As a trib­ute to the na­tion's ju­bilee, the Sec­ondary Schools Dra­ma As­so­ci­a­tion (SS­DA) has themed their 2012 Fes­ti­val of plays, 50 years of In­de­pen­dence.

The SS­DA is an NGO that has been sup­port­ed by the Min­istries of Arts and Mul­ti­cul­tur­al­ism and Ed­u­ca­tion for a num­ber of years. For 47 years, the or­gan­i­sa­tion has brought dra­ma/the­atre and dra­ma/the­atre ed­u­ca­tion to the youths of our coun­try.

The SS­DA is not on­ly known for its an­nu­al dra­ma fes­ti­val, but an ar­ray of ac­tiv­i­ties through­out the year that fo­cus­es on the ob­jec­tive of the de­vel­op­ment of dra­ma/the­atre in the coun­try.

With the vi­sion of its pre­de­ces­sors such as founder James Lee Wah and past pres­i­dent Vic­tor Ed­wards, a tra­di­tion was start­ed and to­day the vol­un­tary mem­bers of the cur­rent ex­ec­u­tive and their pres­i­dent An­der­son La Bar­rie con­tin­ue to forge that tra­di­tion in Trinidad and To­ba­go and its ed­u­ca­tion sys­tem.

Since the launch of the fes­ti­val in May, a two-day Di­rec­tors' Work­shop was held in Sep­tem­ber. A Play­wrights' Work­shop in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Trinidad The­atre Work­shop fol­lowed in Oc­to­ber.

Stu­dents and teach­ers now have the op­por­tu­ni­ty to cre­ate and pro­duce orig­i­nal scripts that deal with pa­tri­o­tism. They al­so have the op­tion of en­ter­ing un­der an­oth­er top­i­cal is­sue, Vi­o­lence in Schools.

The fes­ti­val has al­ways been an in­tense and en­ter­tain­ing 13 days. This year it promis­es even more, start­ing with the pre­lim­i­nary round from No­vem­ber 5 at var­i­ous sec­ondary schools through­out the coun­try. The semi­fi­nals will be at Na­pari­ma Bowl with nine plays in three days.

The fes­ti­val cul­mi­nates on No­vem­ber 24 and 25 at the Bowl and will be open to the pub­lic at an af­ford­able price.

More In­fo

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