Learning to Drive

Student Performance Helping Educate High Schoolers
November 18, 2011

The wildly funny, harrowing, and beautiful play by Paula Vogel "How I Learned to Drive" traces a woman's path through time as she recalls learning the rules of the road (and life) from behind the wheel of her uncle's '62 Buick Riviera. 

While the play's run has ended, the Theatre program hopes to raise $2,000 to take the show on the road for a Sonoma and Napa high school educational tour. 

But some fundraising is needed to do so. The SSU School of Performing Arts theatre program has turned to innovative new site "Kickstarter" to help with fundraising.

UPDATE: The fundraising through "Kickstarter" has a deadline of Dec. 19! If Performing Arts does not raise the $2,000 by then, they will lose the money.

The money would fund the costs of touring the play, and provide study guides, facilitators, post-show discussion and support materials to facilitate discussion on sexual abuse with teens.

"For the cost of two lattes, you can make theater happen in Sonoma and Napa County high schools," says production manager Juliet Pokorny, pointing out that if 400 people pledge just $5, the project will be fully funded.

Kickstarter is an innovative approach to funding creative projects. Contributors pledge small amounts, as little as $1, to creative endeavors they would like to see come to fruition. Project creators retain complete ownership and control of their work-- which could be anything from music to film, to design or publishing. 

If the project doesn't reach its funding goal, the Theatre program loses any money raised, which is an added incentive to give--and to give often, says Pokorny.

A one-dollar pledge to the How I Learned to Drive School Tour, earns a thank you in the tour program, while those pledging $1,000 or more will be recognizedwith a sponsoring title in the tour program and a mention from the stage at each performance. The graduated scale includes many degrees of recognition in between.

For more information on the project, or to donate visit www.kickstarter.com and search for "How I Learned to Drive School Tour."