Mercersburg Academy is a private, college-prep boarding school located in south-central Pennsylvania, about 90 minutes from the Baltimore/Washington DC metro area. The school’s mission and core values guide our vision and direction. At Mercersburg, we value diversity and believe in cultivating a safe community where everyone is encouraged to be their authentic selves.

Job Classification:  

Faculty, Full-Time, Academic Year, Exempt 

Reports To:  

Burgin Center Director of Operations 

Overview

The Burgin Center for the Arts is a multi-functional facility that includes a 600-seat proscenium theatre, a 100-seat studio theatre, and multiple classrooms and rehearsal rooms. It is used throughout the year for school events and meetings as well as 3 theatre productions, 3 dance concerts, and multiple musical concerts. Working as part of the Leadership Team of the Burgin Center, the TD will assist in supporting academic, co-curricular, and community-wide programming. 

Responsibilities and Duties

Administration and Building Operation:

• Responsible for the scene shop which includes:
  • Cleaning and maintaining all scene shop equipment.
  • Implementing and maintaining an organized, clean, and safe shop environment.
• Responsible for coordinating the work of the Facilities Department and Campus Safety Department in the Burgin Center.
• Maintain inventory of equipment in the building including sound, props, lights, lifts, etc.
• Responsible for the technical elements of school community events. This includes:
  • Coordinating all AV needs for School Meetings, Lecture series, etc.
  • Communicating all set-up needs for the Front of the House 
  • Supervising all work orders for special event setups 

Co-curricular

• Supervise student technical crews and develop a training program to build an ongoing student technical production team. Develop a cohort of students who are trained to meet the demands of technical theatre production and work effectively as a team.
• With student technical crews, responsible for implementing designs for the technical elements of productions and concerts. This includes:
• Creating construction drawings 
• Creating cut lists and planning for materials needed
• Completing the building of the scenery
• Completing any changes to the lighting plot needed
• Completing any setup of staging needed
• Completing the setup of any sound equipment needed.
• Supervising the cleanliness and organization of the backstage area during all productions
• Responsible for implementing set/lighting designs. This includes:
• Creating construction drawings 
• Creating cut lists and planning for materials needed
• Completing the building of the scenery
• Completing any changes to the lighting plot needed
• Completing any setup of staging needed
• Supervising the cleanliness and organization of the backstage area during all productions
• Responsible for the sound design for PGA productions. This includes:
  • Working with the Production Director to choose songs/sound effects that match the production concept.
  • Setting up and operating all mics and monitors needed for the production
  • Supervising the set up of all backstage headsets and the backstage monitor system (audio & video) for use during the production

Residential: This position may participate in all aspects of the school including participation in our student life program which includes advisory to a group of students, chaperoning student activities, and student support.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

• Self-motivated.
• A record of successful work with teenagers in a theatre environment.
• Possess strong interpersonal and organizational skills, and the ability to manage multiple responsibilities and interact in a team environment. 
• Intermediate to advanced skills with technology and software such as Office Suite, Google Suite, Adobe Suite, and Vectorworks or Auto Cad.
• The ability to work a schedule that must be flexible to support activities and programs that occur in the evenings and on weekends.  
• Flexible and adaptable to meet the needs of an ever-changing boarding school environment.

Physical Demands:  

The conditions herein are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform essential job functions. 

Environment: Work is performed mostly in an indoor environment.

Physical: Primary functions require sufficient physical ability and mobility to climb, balance, stoop, kneel, crouch, crawl, reach, stand, walk, push, pull, lift, using repetitive motions; to lift to 50 lbs., carry, push, and /or pull moderate amounts of weight.; sufficient manual dexterity and eye-hand coordination to operate a variety of building trades tools and equipment and vehicles; and to verbally communicate to exchange information. 

Vision: Required to have visual acuity, with or without correction, to be able to see close activities, to tell differences among colors distance, and focus to operate hand tools. 

Auditory: Must be able to express or exchange ideas by means of the spoken word.