Theatre Assistant Externships offer a unique professional development opportunity connecting the theatre arts classroom to the theatrical workplace. They provide an experience in which Theatre Assistants spend time in a working theatre to learn through direct experience about trends, skill requirements, and opportunities in industries related to their subject, in order to enrich and strengthen their theatre knowledge and bring relevance to production and student learning. There are many types of workplace experiences, such as student internships, teacher externships, job shadowing, informational interviewing, and service learning. Externships range from a day of job shadowing to longer externships that are usually project-based and can last as long as a full summer or semester. Theatre Assistant externships offer a professional development experience that is often transformative for
future theatre directors and their students.

The purpose of a theatre assistant externship is to engage in activities to learn how community and youth theatre productions are produced and directed. Theatre Assistants improve their theoretical practices by learning and incorporating new teaching methods and employment skills that meet current industry standards. The educational goal of an externship is to increase a theatre assistants ability to connect theory and practice and bring an understanding of workplace practices and policies (e.g. problem solving methods, practical applications of theory, leadership concepts) into the theatre, thus increasing the relevance of student learning.

With first-hand exposure, theatre assistants can learn to design and implement theatre production activities, projects and work-based learning opportunities that will add relevance and meaning to students’ learning. Externships provide a fresh perspective that lets potential new directors tie curriculum to real-world applications. Thus gaining ability to explain the value of what students are learning.