CITIZENS

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“They don’t just go to city council meetings,” Snider said. “They have to present a resolution that they want to get passed, and we go to the school board meetings, and they have to present ideas in front of the school board. This idea of don’t just sit back and be a resident of Muncie, be an active participant in what’s happening in your community. Because if you don’t, we’re gonna have roads that you’re not happy with. You’re gonna have programs that you don’t like, so do something about it.”

She said she has even been reminding students they only have to be 18 years old to run for mayor. Students in her class this past November were involved in the election as poll workers and saw how they noticed things such as how many voted “straight ticket,” when a voter selects all nominees of a political party for partisan offices on a ballot, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

The idea from Williams, Snider and others on the project is to get students to experience civics beyond the classroom, so they can apply the lessons learned to their lives.

Snider said she has a desire for future partnerships with Ball State academic departments, such as the political science department, recycling entities, local businesses and anyone else who wants to help students get experience outside the classroom.

“My vision for the CREATE project is to not only create wonderful opportunities for our students and our teachers but then to create some sustainability for that,” Chuck Reynolds, superintendent of MCS, said. “After the grant has gone, we have curated resources, embedded opportunities for field trips and then real-world experiences that were kickstarted by the project.”

Reynolds and others know students may not stay in Muncie, so they prepare them for life beyond town borders.Wherever they end up, the project seeks to create citizens that go beyond boundaries.

“Kids growing up in a community that realize they have a purpose,” Williams said, “it will make our democratic society, not only just in Muncie and Delaware County and Indiana but throughout the United States and throughout the world … that’s a powerful frame when you look at it from the lens [of] ‘I’m not just a person of the city of Muncie, I’m also a member of our world. What can I do to make the world a better place?’”

Contact Abigail Denault with comments via email at abigail.denault@bsu.edu.

Although it is part of their studies, Templeton and Hreno are proud of their work at Northside and find it rewarding to direct the middle schoolers, Hreno said. Seeing the students open up and come out of their shells is the part they enjoy the most, they said.

“Seeing them come up with silly jokes as a group is so much fun, and we always like to make it part of the show if it works,” Hreno said. “The way they pal around with each other as friends has a way of bringing back the inner child in me.”

Templeton and Hreno recognize this as a stepping stone in their journeys to become theatre educators, they each said. For their fourth and final years as THEDs, they have secondary practicums — otherwise known as student teaching — lined up in two high schools in Indiana.

“We won’t just be directing plays when we’re student teaching,” Hreno said. “We’ll also be teaching English classes during the school day unlike what we do at Northside. I’m so excited to have a theatre classroom of my own one day.”

While the Ball State students working in the spring show have the support of the theatre education department, they work with only one member of the Northside faculty who acts as a liaison between them and the Northside students. However, Hreno and Templeton see it not as a hassle but as an opportunity.

“We might not work with many Northside folks, but that also means that we have more creative freedom to put on our show and teach the kids everything we can teach them,” Hreno said.

“We’re grateful that they trust us enough to give us that freedom.”

Contact Miguel Naranjo with comments at miguel.naranjo@bsu.edu or on Twitter @ naranjo678.

“This is the perfect location for it,” Frobig said. “This is such a good collection of items that I feel like they’ll get pretty good business being here.”

Frobig acknowledged that thrifting is becoming a more common way to buy clothing. The growth of consumers buying more from secondhand stores comes from wanting to be more sustainable, according to GlobalData. She thinks this will draw more customers to the shop.

“I feel like something that’s really popular right now is thrifting and antiquing, so as more and more people find out about it, it will certainly garner more and more business.”

However, customers can do more than just shop for clothes at this vintage store. There is a couch and a television in the back of the store where customers can watch a movie or play video games.

Pope and Edwards realize there are not many places for people to hang out in Muncie, so they

“I want it to be a space where people can just come hang out, maybe listen to a record, watch a VHS movie, play an old video game they used to play as a kid, just something that brings back nostalgia,” Pope

The store has already led to fond memories for Edwards. While he and Pope were putting the store together, customers were already waiting to come in.

“They were just walking to our store, and just that was kind of like a signifier that we were making the right move,” he said.

Pope said his fondest memory was the end of their grand opening. Even though it was on a Wednesday, there was a line outside, and people enjoyed seeing all the pieces for sale.

In the future, Pope and Edwards hope to open a second location. Right now, organizing the shop and constantly changing things like the décor in order to keep the look of the shop different is the main focus.

“This is a very rough sketch of what we want it to look like in the end,” Pope said.

Well Made Vintage is open six days a week and can be found at 1614 W University Ave., Muncie, IN 47303. More information on their hours can be found on their website.

Contact Lily Jones with comments at lkjones3@ bsu.edu.