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  • Allison Gamlen’s journey from actor to arts educator

    Allison Gamlen’s journey from actor to arts educator


    Allison Gamlen’s drama class forms a power circle.

    Credit: Courtesy of Allison Gamlen

    Allison Gamlen has always believed the show must go on. During the depths of the pandemic, when schools were shuttered and many children were suffering from fear and isolation, the arts educator fought to keep her students engaged. 

    When she realized some kids were turning their cameras off and playing video games during her Zoom drama class, she decided to hold some rehearsals in person, in the park. It was important to her that her students keep learning about the arts, but it was even more important to give them a space to connect. These outdoor rehearsals were entirely optional. Students kept their distance and wore masks, but they still found great comfort in that bond.

    “It was a hard time for the kids, for all of us really,” said Gamlen, visual and performing arts coordinator for the San Mateo County Office of Education. “I just wanted to give them some people to connect with. I could cry right now just talking about how moving it was. We made a community, and I wanted to keep that community intact.”

    Gamlen, a 45-year-old single mother, brings a chipper, can-do attitude to her work, particularly the need to be there for young people amid the escalating youth mental health crisis. Giving children a chance to voice their deepest, darkest feelings is at the core of the therapeutic powers of arts education. That’s a key reason Gamlen and other arts educators are cheering the advent of Proposition 28, which guarantees funding, roughly $1 billion this year, for music and arts education in TK-12. 

    “The need for arts education has never been greater,” said Jill MacLean, the director of American Conservatory Theater’s Young Conservatory. “I’ve witnessed many times over, especially these past few years, the transformative power of even the simplest theater-based experiences can be a lifeline to a child. For those who are struggling with anything from discovering their identity and interests to dealing with trauma – having a medium that celebrates uniqueness and grants permission to be creative while rewarding collaboration and focused effort – is exceptionally beneficial. The very foundation of acting is connecting to another human being, to share stories as a way to find meaning and relationship to others in the world.”

    Like many in the teaching arts field, Gamlen is an educator, but she’s also an artist. She first fell in love with the theater at age 3 when her grandmother took her to a Japanese puppetry version of “Macbeth.” Some little kids might have been intimidated by the Scottish play, but she was entranced.

    “I remember this intense feeling,” she said. “I remember the colors, red and black, and I remember feeling like there was no disconnect between me and the performers. I felt immersed in it, and it was so terrifying and so exciting and so unlike anything I had ever seen. I knew that was for me. That world.”

    She cut her teeth as an actor and dancer. In addition to her work in the schools, she also teaches musical theater at San Francisco’s American Conservatory Theater’s youth conservatory. She also recently appeared in the company’s campy revival of “The Wizard of Oz.”

    In traditional showbiz fashion, she paid her dues waiting tables, auditioning for parts and barely scraping by, until one fateful day in LA, watching her toddler, Anna, flap around the backyard in butterfly wings, tall green boots and a bug antenna. She found herself confronting the reality that she needed a stable income and health insurance to raise her child. Being a starving artist wore out its welcome.

    “I couldn’t even go buy a cup of coffee. I had negative money,” she said, in a typical light-hearted quip about a heavy subject. “There were definitely times I was on food stamps, to be honest with you, for the early part of my life. Diapers alone will kill you.”

    That day, Gamlen decided to move back home with her parents in the Bay Area, go back to school and pursue a teaching credential in arts education. Everything fell into place after that. She considers her current role as visual and performing arts coordinator for San Mateo County to be her dream job.

    “Arts education access is a student right,” she said. “I love getting to work with students, teachers, and school leaders to improve student outcomes through increasing arts equity.”

    That may be one reason Gamlen radiates optimism. While some in arts education circles have focused on the complications of implementing Proposition 28, which will put the arts back into classrooms after decades of cutbacks, she prefers to keep her eye on the upside. For example, there will soon be thousands of new jobs for arts educators, many of whom, like Gamlen, have long struggled to get by as artists. 

    “I am so stoked,” she said.  “I know we’re hearing there’s a lot of questions and challenges, but it’s phenomenal. It’s so fantastic. So I can deal with the waiting. I can deal with the uncertainty.”

    Like most arts educators, she sees her work as an avocation rather than a job. She believes in the power of the arts to elevate the educational experience and many say that commitment shows in her work.

    “She is one of our newest and most active county arts leads and has made a great impression on me,” said Letty Kraus, director of the California County Superintendents’ statewide arts initiative. “She is very energetic and engaged in her work supporting arts education in her county, and very collaborative in her interactions and contributions to our network.”

    She’s also a practical soul, often encouraging students to pursue media arts so they can snag a high-paying Silicon Valley tech job if they want to afford to live in the Bay Area. 

    “What makes Allison stand out, aside from her own skill set and artistry, is her keen interest in providing students with concrete tools they can take with them for their future experiences,” said MacLean.

    There’s certainly a treasure trove of knowledge and nuance to be mined in a comprehensive arts education. Theater classes combine learning the craft of the actor with a deep understanding of how to best interpret the text. Actor training often taps into disciplines as diverse as history, literature and movement in order to make the leap from page to stage. If you are studying a scene from Athol Fugard’s “Master Harold … and the Boys,” for instance, you must take a deep dive into the legacy of colonialism, race and apartheid as well as the art of ballroom dancing.

    “Allison’s knowledge about the process of acting, and her ability to break it down and make it accessible to young actors, is a gift,” said MacLean. “She understands the value of creating scaffolding to build a strong foundation when working with students. From a teaching standpoint, we are only as strong as our ability to effectively communicate the tools of trade.”

    The lessons Gamlen hopes to impart go far beyond acting, however. She also hopes to help create a nurturing environment for a generation of students living through tumultuous times. 

    “It’s our job to create a safe space for them,” she said. “Students in this generation are living through the craziest times I can remember. I was there with them for that spooky orange sky day, and the insurrection and the inauguration too. The arts absolutely can be a place to process those things.”





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  • Allison Gill: Did the Supreme Court Waffle on the Return of the Unjustly Imprisoned Man from Maryland?

    Allison Gill: Did the Supreme Court Waffle on the Return of the Unjustly Imprisoned Man from Maryland?


    ICE swept up a Maryland man and deported him to the infamous prison in El Salvador for terrorists and hardened criminals. But Abrego Garcia was not a terrorist or a gang member. The Trump administration admitted that his arrest and detention was an “administrative error” but claimed that he could not be returned because he was no longer in U.S. jurisdiction. The lower federal courts ordered the administration to bring him back. The Trump administration objected–unwilling to bring home an innocent victim of their error–and the case went to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court released a unanimous ruling that seemed to favor the return of Abrego Garcia.

    Allison Gill took a close look at the decision and finds many opportunities in its decision to keep Mr. Garcia imprisoned.

    She wrote:

    It appears to be a victory – that the Supreme Court “unanimously” agrees that the government must “facilitate” the return of Abrego Garcia – the Maryland father that was disappeared to the CECOT torture prison in El Salvador on a government-admitted “administrative error.” 

    But the Supreme Court did the wrong thing here by even bothering to weigh in.

    The Breakdown is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

    Do you remember in the immunity ruling, when the Supreme Court sent the case back down to Judge Chutkan after they made their “rule for the ages?” They shoved their robes where they didn’t belong because they should have just denied Trump’s application. Remanding it back to the District Court left the door open for Judge Chutkan’s clarification on official acts to be appealed again – all the way back up to the Supreme Court if necessary – so that the supremes could once again have final say over what the lower court had decided. It also had the added bonus of tacking at least another year of delay onto the case – provided the Supreme Court would have let the case live after the second go-round.

    In the Abrego Garcia case, the liberal justices say they would have denied Trump’s application outright, leaving the lower court order in place:

    Because every factor governing requests for equitable relief manifestly weighs against the Government, Nken v. Holder, 556 U. S. 418, 426 (2009), I would have declined to intervene in this litigation and denied the application in full. (Statement of Justice Sotomayor, with whom Justice Kagan and Justice Jackson join.)

    Technically, the ruling is unanimous because the three liberal justices ultimately agree with the court’s ruling, but by intervening instead of denying the application outright, the Supreme Court is asking the District Court to clarify it’s ruling “with due regard” to Trump: 

    The rest of the District Court’s order remains in effect but requires clarification on remand.The order properly requires the Government to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador. The intended scope of the term “effectuate” in the District Court’s order is, however, unclear, and may exceed the District Court’s authority. The District Court should clarify its directive, with due regard for the deference owed to the Executive Branch in the conduct of foreign affairs.

    The District Court should clarify its directive, with due regard for the deference owed to the Executive Branch in the conduct of foreign affairs. I mean, you could park a truck in that sentence. It might as well say “Hey District Court, go ahead and give it a shot but don’t cross the blurry lines we aren’t going to draw and don’t break the secret rules which we aren’t going to tell you about. See you in a month!” 

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    They were super vague on their instructions to the lower court in the immunity ruling, too: virtually guaranteeing the case would come before them again. Remember Footnote 3? It was about as clear as mud:

    “[a] prosecutor may point to the public record to show the fact that the President performed the official act. And the prosecutor may admit evidence of what the President allegedly demanded, received, accepted, or agreed to receive or accept in return for being influenced in the performance of the act. … What the prosecutor may not do, however, is admit testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing the official act itself. Allowing that sort of evidence would invite the jury to inspect the President’s motivations for his official actions and to second-guess their propriety. As we have explained, such inspection would be “highly intrusive” and would “ ‘seriously cripple’ ” the President’s exercise of his official duties. … And such second-guessing would threaten the independence or effectiveness of the Executive.”

    And just as with the immunity ruling, the Supreme Court will likely get another review of whatever the court orders the Trump administration to do to return Abrego Garcia. Because I’m pretty sure that the government isn’t going to want to do what the lower court tells it to, nor will it be forthcoming with the steps it’s taking to comply with court orders. The Trump administration will say “The Supreme Court told you to have deference for how we conduct foreign affairs. You’re not deferencing enough.”

    So yes, it’s awesome that the Supreme Court didn’t outright abandon Abrego Garcia, but now we’re going to potentially drag out the remedy – while a man is wrongfully imprisoned in a gulag – and give the Supremes another at-bat when things don’t go smoothly. The high court should have outright denied the application, just as they should have done in the immunity case. 

    Just my two cents. 

    ~AG



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