Faculty Spotlight

MR. JOSHUA KONEGNI-GRANT

After a 10 to 12 year drought, MHS has hired Mr. Joshua Konegni-Grant to teach Drama and rebuild the department. Mr. “K”, as his students call him, has a B.F.A. in Theatre from the University of Utah's Professional Actor Training Program. Joshua has worked professionally as an actor with both the Screen Actors' Guild and Actors' Equity Association. His teaching credential is in English Language Arts with a focus on Secondary Education. After finishing that program, he taught Beginning and Intermediate Acting, Voice and Speech, the History of American Theatre and Movement and Audition Techniques at Los Angeles High School of the Arts. He continues studying to get his MEd in Curriculum and Instruction. And now he is at good old MHS, teaching Drama and the History of Theatre in G-2 to 210 students, most of whom up until now had never attended a stage production, didn’t know stage right from left or what blocking meant except in relation to a football game. I was lucky enough to spend the day with him. I found myself so engrossed in one of his classes that without even realizing, I was doing one of his assignments. In another class, many students were in tears, including moi, as several of Mr. K’s kids read from their journals. The assignment was to write about what they wanted to accomplish in their future and what was holding them back. That day he spent his lunch hour in a 1 on 1 coaching session with a student, Taylor. She was going to do 2 monologues, in her first-ever competition. BTW, Taylor and all the other MHS kids made it through 3 of the 5 rounds of competition. Not bad for their very 1st exposure. Joshua is hoping their 1st production will be in March 2011. He has a daunting task ahead of him, to build a program from near nothing. But he is looking forward to the challenge.  

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