March 26, 2025

Dr. Mike Poblete To Discuss Student Agency In Devised Theatre Education At Book Launch Event

Dr. Mike Poblete, instructional assistant professor in Theatre, will discuss his new book about devised theatre education on April 3 from 5 to 7 p.m. in the Liberal Arts and Arts and Humanities Building, Room 255.

Poblete’s book, “Student Agency in Devised Theatre Education: Creating Collaborative Theatre in Virtual and In-Person Classrooms,” was published by Routledge in February. He will lead a panel discussion alongside Dr. Dinesh Yadav, associate professor in Theatre, and Dr. Marcia Montague, clinical assistant professor in the College of Education and Human Development.

The book examines how student agency — learning through an individual’s own initiatives — works with devised theatre and its process of creating a play without a completed text at the beginning.

In 2021, Poblete developed a devised theatre project with a drama class at Waipahu High School — pictured above — as part of his Ph.D. dissertation research at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa. The purpose was to assess whether the students experienced any shifts in their outlooks on learning and their sense of self-agency after engaging in devised theatre, he said.

“The book operates at the intersection of devised theatre and drama education,” Poblete said. “This methodology can be effective in cultivating student agency, promoting robust feedback and encouraging positive outlooks on learning broadly, as well as control over individuals’ lives and their sense of self within their community.”

Typically in educational devised theatre, as the group is working toward a production, the instructor will make the final call on what content will make it into the final performance, Poblete said.

“A big premise of my study was to give the students as much control over the entire process as possible — creatively and educationally,” Poblete said. “And if they do that, they may feel more agency over the project.”

Poblete observed different forms of student agency while creating a devised work with students. Resisting agency was defined by students who verbalized that they didn’t want to engage or participate. Passive agency was when a student was neither engaging constructively nor showing resistance.

“As an example of passive agency, the student could be on their phone during class, which is not helping, and is not actively pushing back,” he said. “But it’s still something. In the book, I argue that these ideas around resisting agency also apply to passive. We can capitalize and strategize around passive agency, as it has really interesting implications in online environments.”

The data showed improvements in each student’s learning outlook. He also found no distinction among the students who asserted themselves constructively, passively or with resistance, and their participation in the production.

“If they were asserting themselves more, they were going to get more out of the experience, regardless of how they were asserting themselves,” Poblete said. “They are going to have that shift in learning broadly, as well as a sense of agency over their lives, and they are going to be more engaged in the final show.”

Poblete said he hopes readers take away a better understanding of student agency and its impact on a student’s learning experience.

“It’s really humbling to think I could offer a small contribution to what I hope could be a radical rethinking of how we teach,” he said. “One that puts students first and celebrates their cultural differences as assets. And one that leans into what makes every person unique, and acknowledges how they learn and express themselves is valid and useful within a classroom and art space.”

Top photo of a drama class at Waipahu High School courtesy of Mike Poblete.