Within minutes, the quiet tent set up on the plaza filled with elementary students, visiting the campus and college students dropping by to get a glimpse of the Musical Theater Tour Troupe.

As a part of the NKU Celebration week, the Musical Theater Tour Troupe showcased their talents and hard work by performing numbers from hit musicals such as “Wicked,” “South Pacific” and “Spring Awakening.” A crowd favorite was a Disney medley containing songs from “Mary Poppins,” “Cinderella,” “Songs of the South” and more.

Performing in the group of musical theatre students was Junior Dakota Dean, a musical theater major, who described the group as “a really tight family”.

“Everything is really fun about it,” Dean said. “Working with Jamey Strawn is amazing because he is super talented and has lots of awesome ideas for our troupe and he sets us up to go to places and perform. It’s just a lot of fun to perform for kids who might not get to be exposed to the arts.”

For Dean the choice to pursue theater was easy, but sometimes others don’t understand why she does what she does and how she’s going to make a living off of it, which according to Dean can become very frustrating.

“People always say, ‘Well do you have a back up plan?’ and I say ,’No I don’t actually, because I am going full throttle at my dream and I don’t want to do anything else,’” Dean said.  “I just want to do it. I want to act, I want to perform  and I want to show my talents that I believe the universe gave me to share with the world. So I don’t have a back up plan and it makes me really mad when people say, ‘Oh well, you know you’re just one out of a billion and there’s a billion girls just like you.”’

Dean says that she can’t imagine herself doing anything else and is glad she made the choice to pursue musical theater.

“I’ve been doing this my entire life,” Dean said. “I don’t know what else I’d do.”