Theatre Design & Technology - Winter 2020 - 21

Gateway Mentees and Mentors, 2016 | Photo: Courtesy of USITT.

connections that will extend beyond that
weekend. But, this program would have a
crucial difference from many other mentorship programs: The mentee would
be identified first. As Allee-Forman challenged: "Who needs it in a fundamental
way?" Only then would the mentor be
recruited in order to provide the best
match for a young person searching for
community.
Gateway's original structure also
drew inspiration from the Board Mentee
Program, which had begun just a few
years before. The idea of taking a risk,
accepting what doesn't work, and making each year a little better, was also a
natural model for theatre artists, and familiarity with this creative process made
the organizing committee a bit more
fearless. Asbell-Swanger remembers
feeling relief that this project would not
be "talked to death, stick a baby toe in
the water, if it doesn't work, never again."
Accordingly, the project's structures and
approaches have changed over the years
to better meet the needs of the participants, including a recent move to a twoyear program to help build longer-lasting
relationships.
In addition, an important difference
between Gateway and its inspiration,
SMMP, was that mentees would not be
assigned activities or duties. Because of
this, mentees did not have to be matched
with activities or evaluated on specific

skills, and the week could be less about
the doing and more about the being. An
additional point was the awareness that
the national conference was daunting for
anyone as a first-time attendee, and that
barrier was an additional one to overcome. After all, as David Stewart said
about his first conference, "I'm a 40-yearold man feeling alienated by this space.
How must it feel to be 21?"
Gateway's commitment to funding
opportunities is vital for expanding access to the discipline, the conference,
and the industry. For fifth-year mentee
Amelia St. John, the Gateway funding
made conference attendance possible in
a way it would not be otherwise. "A lot
of people work and work because they
don't have the safety net to attend, and
that is a huge perspective that's missing,"
she says. As a Native American, she sees
herself underrepresented in every field,
in a culture where theatre is "not seen
as a way out of your own hardships; it's
seen as a luxury."
Community and Inclusion: The
first night of the 2014 conference included a dinner for the mentor/mentee pairs
and some members of the committee.
In the words of one mentee, it felt like a
family dinner and was a great help in orienting them for the busy week to come,
or, in the words of mentee Madilynn
Garcia, "showing up the next day to
5,000 colleagues." At the dinner, the

group had an opportunity to talk about
expectations, who they were, and their
career goals. For the rest of the week,
each day the mentee and mentor would
check in and discuss the opportunities of
the day. There was no expectation that
the pair would spend every moment together, but would support each other as
needed to receive the most benefit from
each day and from the conference as a
whole. In fact, the aim was to emphasize
that no mentor had all the answers. Not
knowing exactly the "right" career path
upon graduation from school was not a
fear but something to accept and even
celebrate.
Although mentors were concerned
that they would not be able to give
enough time, it was clear that this was
different from the all-day commitment of
SMMP. The mentor served as a touchstone to lead through the conference,
and the whole Gateway group could be
a collective. Andi Lyons remembers feeling, "Okay, there's hope. They can see
themselves belonging, not just being allowed to be there."
The effects of the program expand
into the conference at large, as well. As
a second-time Gateway mentor, Britton
Mauk felt even more empowered to take
outreach efforts beyond the Gateway
room. Mauk remembers watching young
people exit sessions early and decided to
check in with them. "Gateway gave me

WINTER 2020 | THEATRE DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY

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Theatre Design & Technology - Winter 2020

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