Poughkeepsie’s Chance Theater may be temporarily shuttered for renovations, but it’s already preparing for its next act. The historic theater will soon serve as a hands-on classroom for a nonprofit workforce development initiative that offers technical and administrative courses in the performing arts.
The Empire Training Center for the Arts, co-founded by Poughkeepsie residents Trish Santini and Frank Butler, was created to provide training opportunities in communities that are historically underrepresented in the performing arts and also to encourage more diversity in the industry’s technical and administrative sectors. Additionally, the initiative aims to provide an accessible, high-quality education for adults seeking an alternative to traditional college degrees.
“We feel really passionately about vocational training and the ways in which over the last few decades, not only in our business but across the board, there has been this emphasis on every career requiring a college degree,” says Santini, who previously served as the inaugural executive director of the Little Island public park in New York City.
The ETCA will offer a 10-month, three-day-a-week program with skills-based training and experience that will also focus on how to build relationships within the industry and help students find jobs. For Santini and Butler, the Hudson Valley was a natural location.
“There are a number of arts organizations here,” says Santini. “Even more in the last few years, and that doesn't seem to be a trend that's slowing down.”
Wanting to start the program in Poughkeepsie, they teamed up with the Walkway Group, a Poughkeepsie-based real estate development firm, which acquired The Chance in 2023. The theater opened in July 1912, and over its 112-year history, it's been a playhouse, silent film cinema, and concert hall. The Walkway Group saw the theater purchase as a significant investment in revitalizing the city’s arts and culture scene. “They were really public in their statements to the press about their perception of the value of arts and culture,” says Santini.
Applications for the first classes in stagecraft and technology open in November 2024 and classes are planned for the spring of 2025. Led by Butler, these classes train students as stage hands and audio and video technicians.
“What we have is a theater resource,” says Butler, former director of production at the New York City performance space the Shed. “We're not training actors, we're not training singers, we're not training performers. It's technicians. And we have a theater space for it. With the burgeoning technology that you see out there, video is exploding. More and more art forms and more and more opportunities exist for video, audio, with content being played from boardrooms to ballrooms, classrooms, and theaters everywhere. And there just frankly aren’t enough workers that are trained at the highest professional levels. So, there's a huge opportunity there for people to make really decent money, make a living, doing things that don't require a college education in the audio and visual realms.”
Arts administration will be the next course. “On the arts administration track, we'll train in communications, fundraising, and company management,” says Santini. “Company management is a role that really sits at the center in between the business side and the artists themselves. So, it's a great position to learn because it has other opportunities beyond company managers. A lot of company managers eventually work in general management. Some become producers, but it really is a job that gives you a complete view of the whole business because they intersect with almost everybody. And with all of these jobs, just like on the technical side, there's more demand than there is supply right now. The other piece that we took into consideration is the needs of the industry, but these are all jobs with transferable skills.”
An arts background is not required to apply for the program. “You have to be over 18, you have to be a legal adult, and our values have to resonate with you,” says Santini. “The values of the organization are curiosity, collaboration, and problem solving. If you get excited and inspired by that, then we can teach you the rest because these are qualities you need to have to work in our business.”
While the organization will reach out to schools they’ll also consider adults looking for new careers or a career change, a second act so to speak. “We're in conversations with some folks who work with formerly incarcerated populations and individuals that are trying to get back into the workplace and need new training,” says Santini. “So it's broad and diverse, and that's the point. It’s to make sure that as many people as possible know about the opportunity.”
