The American College Theater Festival (ACTF) is a national, non-profit theater program involving 18,000 students annually from colleges and universities across the country. The organization is divided into eight geographic regions; Region 1 represents much of New England, including Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Northeast New York, Rhode Island, Vermont. ACTF has grown into a network of more than 600 academic institutions where theater departments and student artists showcase their work and receive outside assessment by ACTF respondents.

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The goals of the American College Theater Festival are:

• To encourage, recognize, and celebrate the finest and most diverse work produced in university and college theater programs.

• To provide opportunities for participants to develop their theater skills and insight; and achieve professionalism.

• To improve the quality of college and university theater in America

• To encourage colleges and universities to give distinguished productions of new plays, especially those written by students; the classics, revitalized or newly conceived; and experimental works.

• To build opportunities through leadership and development.

 

Through state, regional, and national festivals, ACTF participants celebrate the creative process, see one another’s work, and share experiences and insights within the community of theater artists. The ACTF honors excellence of overall production and offers student artists individual recognition through awards and scholarships in playwriting, acting, criticism, directing, and design.

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Regional activities are coordinated through eight ACTF regional chairs and eight ACTF playwriting awards chairs. The regional chair coordinates with the Co-Managers of ACTF all aspects of the adjudication of productions on the local and regional level and supervises regional-level ACTF award competitions. The playwriting chair works with schools that have entered new and student-written plays by providing expertise in the development of new scripts–assessment specifically designed for a developing play–and by providing information on the numerous playwriting awards offered.

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In January and February of each year, regional festivals showcase the finest of each region’s entered productions and offer a variety of activities, including workshops, symposia, and regional-level award programs. Since its inception, ACTF has given more than 400,000 college theater students the opportunity to have their work critiqued, improve their dramatic skills and receive national recognition for excellence. More than 16 million theatergoers have attended approximately 10,000 festival productions nationwide.