The Light Lab at State University of New York at Fredonia. Photo courtesy of Fredonia Department of Theatre and Dance. Lighting Technology Education IN THE 21ST CENTURY BY AUTUM CASEY AND TODD PROFFITT Call to action for today's educators T his manuscript is a call to action for all lighting technology educators. Teaching is hard, particularly with rapidly changing technology, budget cuts, a demanding teaching and production schedule, and students with varying backgrounds and interests. Further, the industry and students have changed; production has become significantly more complex and subject knowledge must be counterbalanced with information accessibility more than ever. It is our responsibility to educate lighting students for tomorrow. This article will provide suggestions for how to better work with and prepare modern undergraduates to enter such a fast-paced and rapidly changing industry. The ideas presented in this article are not necessarily new, but this is an opportunity for all lighting educators to reexamine how they teach lighting technology. We can do better. The genesis for this article came from the blog post Are You Teaching Relevant Lighting (http://www.jimonlight.com/2016/01/14/are-you-teachingrelevant-lighting/) in January of 2016. It asked some difficult questions and offered a number of suggestions. The blog then inspired the session "Modernizing Lighting Education" at the 2017 USITT National Conference (http://bit.ly/usittmodernlighting). Though it was a great session, an hour and fifteen minutes was WINTER 2018 | THEATRE DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY | 55http://www.jimonlight.com/2016/01/14/are-you-teaching-relevant-lighting/ http://www.jimonlight.com/2016/01/14/are-you-teaching-relevant-lighting/ http://www.jimonlight.com/2016/01/14/are-you-teaching-relevant-lighting/ http://www.bit.ly/usittmodernlighting http://www.bit.ly/usittmodernlighting