Assistant Professor, Head of Theatre Teaching

Sam Briggs (she/her) is an educator, theatre maker, and creative facilitator who believes that classrooms, rehearsals, meetings, and anywhere else people gather, are most powerful when they're sites of genuine dialogue and collective meaning-making. She is drawn to intentional process design and arts integration as ways of connecting people across difference, opening new ways of thinking, and making the work we do together more meaningful. Her research often explores critical pedagogy in theatre education, and civic engagement within schools and communities. 

As an artist, Sam identifies as a director, deviser, and dramaturg. She has directed numerous plays and musicals in educational and community settings, most recently directing R.U.R. for the University of Utah. As the inaugural Arts & Health Faculty Fellow, she is collaborating with a group of students to devise a performance exploring young adult mental health. She is a founding member of Core V Collective, whose current project, A Bat Mitzvah Past Her Prime, explores agency, choice, and womanhood through an intergenerational, culturally-specific lens. 

Before making the shift to academia, Sam spent 7 years teaching high school in Central Massachusetts. She has won multiple teaching awards, and has worked nationally as a teaching artist and education consultant, partnering with theatres, schools, and community organizations to develop performance-based and arts-integrated programming for both students and teachers.

Sam graduated Summa Cum Laude from Westfield State University with a BA in English Education and a Theatre Arts minor, received an MA in English Literature from Middlebury College's Bread Loaf School of English, and an MFA in Theatre for Youth and Community from Arizona State University.