2014: Year of blessing for Rosebud school and director

Laureen F. Guenther
Times Contributor

 

On the last day of 2014, Paul Muir, Education Director, took time to tell me about the kind of year it was for him and Rosebud School of the Arts (RSA). “It really feels like a time when God is opening the floodgates,” Muir said, “saying, ‘Okay, Rosebud, this is your time. You’re just going to be in a time of blessing right now.’ “
“On the whole support and donations front, we’ve had an unprecedented year,” he said. “We’ve had many many other partners step up to the plate this year.”
Dick and Lois Haskayne made an “unbelievably generous” donation, which, along with a Community Facility Enhancement grant, paid off the mortgage on the Mercantile building. Muir expressed gratitude that the Haskaynes “could see the thing that was blocking that heart (of Rosebud) from being able to actually flourish and do what it’s meant to do.” BMO and Encana were also “fantastic”, he said. Two families also donated vehicles to transport students.
Unexpected blessings came through various challenges RSA faced throughout the year. As the faculty and board worked together to meet those challenges, Muir said, he felt the leadership and the school became even stronger, more united.
This fall had an extra blessing and affirmation for Muir himself, as Trinity Western University (TWU) in Langley, B.C. invited him to be Artist-in-Residence, teaching acting classes and directing their Christmas show. “I was completely honored to be asked,” he said, and is thankful for his “dedicated and talented” colleagues David Snider and Maki Van Dyke, who enabled him to go.
Personally, he’s also grateful that, during those four months, he stayed with an uncle who had invested heavily in Muir’s life when he was a boy. “It really was precious to have that time together (with my uncle). I wouldn’t have traded that for anything,” he said. “This has been a chance for me to give back to him a little bit.”
Overall, his time at TWU was “a lot of affirmation,” he said, “as an acting teacher, as a director and just as someone working as an instructor in this … faith-and-theatre kind of world. There were certainly just lots of affirmations that this is where I’m meant to be.” Teaching at TWU also affirmed that “what we are doing as a school here at Rosebud, that it’s just absolutely right,” he said. “We’re on the right path.”
Coming back, Muir has a clearer perspective of what needs to be “tweaked” at RSA — revamping the theatre tech program, for instance, and refining the Acting Programme. With the debt load gone, RSA is hiring a new recruitment officer and a marketing manager. “I’m really excited about the ways forward from here, in terms of us redefining who we are and how we put ourselves out there in the world,” he said.
RSA signed a transfer agreement with Briercrest College in Saskatchewan in September, so Rosebud students can now transfer more than a year of classes toward a degree. Muir’s in similar discussions with TWU, and said, “I feel confident that before the year is out, we’ll have a similar transfer agreement with Trinity.”
In 2014 and every year, Muir said, the richest blessing is watching students develop. In spring, second and third-year students took study trips to New York and Toronto. In spring and fall, the second-year class performed The Great Divorce and The Masque of Beauty and the Beast. Three students produced successful Final Projects, and, in September, four students graduated as Fellows of Rosebud School of the Arts.
The greatest joy for Muir and his colleagues comes from seeing students grow “in the small little ways, moment to moment, day to day,” he said. “A break-through in someone’s acting always translates into some personal breakthrough. … Ultimately, as artists, and as human beings, we’re all just trying to grow, be more alive, be more present, be healthier, and grow closer to God.”
“One day it might be some little breakthrough, but on another day, it might be a big breakthrough,” he said. “When that stuff happens, all of us just go, ‘Ah, this is why we do what we do.’ “