Storytelling as activism for the youth

Learn more about Philadelphia Young Playwrights collaboration with Vote That Jawn’s June 3 event below. 

By Hannah Gerber

From May 27-July 2, 2026 ArtPhilly is hosting a citywide and multi-disciplinary art festival in conjunction with the nation’s 250 anniversary celebration called What Now. Vote that Jawn will be holding an event on June 3 focusing on amplifying youth voters through performances and workshops.

One of the partners of this event will be the Philadelphia Young Playwrights, a nonprofit entering its 40th year that “brings playwriting and performance storytelling education into classrooms across the city.” This was founded as a way to bridge the gap in literacy education in Philadelphia, “where there wasn’t enough space for young people to be following their own passions when they were thinking about reading and writing.” 

Now Philadelphia Young Playwrights works with close to 2,000 students every year, teaching students playwriting, monologue writing, devising scripts, and performance storytelling. 

On June 3 at 6 p.m. excerpts from two different student-written plays and pieces from this year's Civic Theater Project cohort will be performed.

With the Civic Theater Project, students spent the last year trying to answer the question, “What do you want to see changed in Philadelphia in the next 25 years?” through their art of storytelling. Madeline Charne, the education director for Philadelphia Young Playwrights shared, “it’s a little snapshot into the issues that matter to them.” 

One such issue is the curfews in Philadelphia for the youth, where they are restricted or not allowed unaccompanied after school hours. Charne shared, “there is this acceptance that we can restrict youth in all of these ways. And I think that as we think about our future, we need to be giving youth as unrestricted access to ideas [...] as possible.”

Charne continued, “more than ever, young people are having to deal with the fact that there is so much censorship– whether it’s government censorship or just peer to peer censorship and challenging of people’s voices and ideas.” Theatre being in front of a limited, live audience gives young students a chance to feel freer and be their true authentic self in what they want to share.  

Humanity’s future is in the hands of the youth, yet they are the ones that we do not get to hear from in what issues they care about.

Charne pointed to the fact that young people are not able to vote for or against the “people who will lead them and their futures.” But, giving them this space for the youth to develop and grow their voice to be heard is one major way they can push for change in their community. 

She then referenced a piece one of their students was working on about the places in Philly that are restricted for students after school hours, citing it as another way the government restricts youth. “We need to be giving youth as unrestricted access to ideas and growth and to our change makers (voters) as possible,” Charne asserted. “Investing in youth voices is the only way to actually make a future that we want any of us to live in, but also that our youth deserve.”

Charne personally cited that one of her guiding principles is that  “human beings are wired through stories.” It’s what makes us human, she said, and how humanity has made  sense of the world for so many years. To change people’s minds, she says, “you can tell a story that is captivating enough to [change their perspective].” 

Providing the tools to create and tell stories through playwriting is one tangible practice that youth can use to combat how stories have been used against them in the world, and take the pen for themselves to tell their own stories about their own experiences and injustices. 

Come see youth issues explored through storytelling by coming to What Now on June 3 at 6  p.m.