Thanks to Alyssa Kostello, Capilano University student and President of NOW! Theatre in Vancouver, for this video and blog about her experience participating in the IMPACT! Sustainability Champions Training program. Thanks, as well, to Phil Baudin, Executive Director of Modo The Car Co-op, for his support as a mentor to Alyssa.

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In September 2012 I took part in the IMPACT! Sustainability Champions Program, which opened my doors to funding and mentorship. For the past four months, Phil Baudin from Modo Car Coop has been mentoring me on my sustainability project – NOW! Theatre. My big dream: to revolutionize theatre with sustainable practices.

A little backstory: In 2008 I co-created what was then called the Act NOW! Playwriting Competition through The NOW! Organization. In 2011, I was asked to take over as the new President for NOW!. In 2012, the former President and I had a discussion about turning NOW! into a theatre company, as I had a lot of big theatre plans and was hoping to incorporate sustainability into them anyway. Having NOW! Theatre would make that dream a lot easier, and still keep in line with the mandate.

I had decided while in the IMPACT! Program that NOW! Theatre would start by continuing to run and expanding on the Act NOW! Sustainability Performance Art Competition, would hold a Launch Party and put up a two day showcase of the Act NOW!’s winning entries, get business cards and a new website, and perhaps put on it’s first show, or even become a theatre coop.

Where Phil came in: what I like to call getting my non profit ducks in a row. I have no experience with non profits, other than volunteering with NOW! – I didn’t really know how to run a non profit organization, and I wanted to make sure everything was organized, in order, and that I knew what I was doing. Phil asked me questions and wrote me step-by-step to-do lists. When one list was done, we’d make another. We really only had two and a half to-do lists with other little things on the side. Some of the things I worked on: I made sure I had all the paper work I needed from the former President, I got banking information figured out, a new account opened with VanCity, and knocked some things off my NOW! dream list, making goals for the year more realistic.

It was interesting figuring out how the mentorship was going to work, as Phil is very modest in what he can help with, and totally unfamiliar with the theatre world. So in that way, I think we got to learn from each other. We finished with all the ‘how to run a non profit’ stuff and were trying to figure out what to do next. We hit a wall. But that’s ok! Because it’s great having him there to just support me and help spread the word on NOW!’s projects – while figuring out other ways Modo can be of assistance.

This is what Phil has helped guide me to – NOW! 2013:

-NOW! held it’s first BoD meeting as a theatre company!

-Act NOW! Sustainability Performance Art Competition opens in April and closes September 1. We have posters and pamphlets made, printed and slowly circulating, online word spreading and have booked The Cultch for November 7 and 8 to showcase this year’s winners.

-NOW! Theatre Launch Party – April 8 at CBC Studio – will also be showing a workshopped performance of a play in development that I have been writing.

NOW! is continuing to making more connections and things are really starting to happen! Thanks Phil! And thanks to the Natural Step for putting on IMPACT!, and to The Cooperators for funding us!

http://www.nowtheatre.ca

Future plans: to continue marketing and making Act NOW! a more well known opportunity for youth and working artists across Canada, to further explore and research how theatre and other performance art forms can be more sustainable, start an experiment lab and eventually advise theatres, festivals and artists on how to be more sustainable.

The IMPACT! Sustainability Champions Training program is an incredible opportunity for students aged 19-25 across Canada who care about sustainability and want to make a difference in their community. Participants deepen their sustainability understanding, enhance their confidence as leaders, and are empowered to develop or advance meaningful sustainability projects. Learn more at: www.naturalstep.ca/impact-sustainability-champions-training.

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