WHS Theater Troupe Comes Home Loaded with Awards and Scholarships from the State Festival

by Caroline Wisner

Over the recent weekend the Walkersville High School ITS Troupe competed in the Maryland State Thespian Festival. WHS returned home with a plethora of awards.

The Troupe won chapter select, meaning they can advance to the national festival in Nebraska in June. Senior Megan McGee and sophomore Rachel Boyd also scored a superior for their Musical Theater Individual Event, giving them the opportunity to advance to Nationals. In addition, senior Rachel Wilson was awarded the Maryland Thespian Service Scholarship.

WHS performed their one act play “Know Your Role,” which according to Wilson is about “gender identity and finding your place in society, so there were different scenes about different social situations.” One of Wilson’s scenes was about how people of a certain weight are seen in society.

Sophomore Erin Kopit said “ITS festival was once again a great experience. The two workshops I went to were both about dance, they were so much fun! I also made a bunch of new friends,” said Kopit, “My favorite part though was winning of course.”

Wilson won two individual awards at the festival, “I was awarded best actor within our one act play, and hearing from a judge that I did well was great.” Wilson continued, “I also received a Theater Service Scholarship for everything I have done for the program at the school. It was nice to get the scholarship since I knew the other person up for it had also done a lot of work. So being recognized for my work was great,” said Wilson.

McGee won awards for two events at the festival, “I won one for the one act play and one for a duet performance with Rachel Boyd.” McGee continued, “I feel very proud because theater and the arts is underrated in this county, so to have two big wins that are state titles is pretty amazing, so hopefully people will see how important the arts are,” said McGee.

Drama teacher Heather McFadden was impressed with her troupe’s performance, “I was proud of the way we came together as an ensemble, especially since we had a limited amount of time to prepare.” McFadden is still figuring out the next step for the national festival, “Nationals is a really exciting opportunity, but it’s a very expensive endeavor so I’m not quite sure of what our plan will be,” said McFadden.

No matter what the next move is for the Walkersville ITS troupe is, nationals or not, McFadden and her crew will be excelling.