ABOUT ME
“Tezeru is very accommodating. She’s very easy to work with - which is very nice because we all come from different backgrounds, yet we all are able to work really well with her and each other.”
— DCDS STUDENT
Hello! Selam! Peace and Welcome!
My name is Tezeru (Teh’zeh-roo), which means “harvest” in Amharic, Ethiopia’s major language. Over time, I have come to see that meaning as a reflection of both who I am and how I work and create.
Growing up, I was a quiet kid with a very active imagination. I fell in love with writing in third grade and later found theatre, improvisation, and dance. At first, art gave me somewhere to express all the things I was thinking and feeling. It gave me permission to experiment, play, take risks, and imagine lives beyond my own.
But over time, the practice of making art began shaping the person I was becoming:
Acting required me to pay attention to people - their choices, emotions, contradictions, and circumstances.
Writing taught me to sit with questions and imagine perspectives outside my own.
Rehearsal taught me patience, discipline, listening, and the willingness to try again.
Creating with other people taught me how to collaborate, communicate, and make space for ideas that were not mine
Today, I bring those experiences together through Developing Character, Developing Self. Beyond becoming better artists, I am interested in how theatre and literary arts can become accessible tools for young people to become more curious, compassionate, creative, and connected to one another.
For more than a decade, I have worked as a university theatre faculty member, program leader, researcher, and mentor to young people. I have also served on a juvenile probation oversight commission and developed/led county-wide juvenile probation research and inspection reports across San Diego, California.
I hold a PhD in Drama and Critical Theory and have published research on performance, childhood, theatre, and civic engagement.
Learn more about my work below!
— ADVOCACY
Bringing Youth Voice into
Juvenile Justice Oversight
For nearly a decade, I served as a court-appointed member of the San Diego Juvenile Justice Commission, where I participated in annual inspections of juvenile detention centers, group homes, and lock-up facilities across the county.
These inspections informed formal findings and recommendations reviewed by the courts and probation before being released to the public.
WATCH & LEARN MORE BELOW
THE CHALLENGE - Young people are frequently discussed, evaluated, and represented within juvenile justice systems. Yet they are rarely given meaningful opportunities to speak directly about their experiences or influence the policies designed on their behalf.
THE INITIATIVE - I led the Commission’s first pilot initiative designed to survey young people about their experiences within the system. The survey created a structured opportunity for youth to share their perspectives on safety, services, education, treatment, communication, and daily life. The initiative recognized young people as knowledge holders whose experiences can reveal institutional strengths, gaps, and possibilities for reform.
THE IMPACT - The initiative marked an important shift in how the Commission approaches oversight. It created a pathway for young people’s experiences to become part of our research and decision-making while laying the groundwork for more participatory approaches to juvenile justice accountability.
— TEACHING
EDUCATOR BACKGROUND
-
Developmental College Writing; Core 1000 (English Literature)
-
Flourishing in STEM (College Orientation); Making Legislative Theatre; Creative Minds: Making Legislative Theatre; Introduction to Theatre and Society; Applied Theatre; Play Analysis; Creative Minds: Theatre of the Oppressed; Introduction to Theatre and Society; Creative Minds: Theatre, Math & Engineering
-
Introduction to Black Theatre and Film - 20th Century
-
Latinas in Film (w/Dr. Jade Powers); Playing Indian-Native Am Cinema (w/ Dr. Julie Burelle); Black Girls in Film (Instructor on Record); Cult Films: Weirdly Dramatic (w/Julia Fulton); Cult Films: The Films of Spike Lee (w/Dr. Grace Shin Hae Jun); Glimpse into Acting (w/Todd Salovey); Ethnic Images in Film Studies (w/Dr. Ashvin Rathnanand Kini); African-American Performance (w/Dr. Nadine George-Graves); Introduction to Play Analysis (w/Dr.Nadine George-Graves); Ancient and Medieval Theatre (w/Jason Bogaard Dorwart); Twentieth Century Theatre (w/Dr. John Rouse); Professional Theatre 1500–1900 (w/Dr. Janet Smarr); Introduction to Theatre (w/Todd Salovey)
University
-
Kearny Mesa High School 2022; Herbert Hoover High School 2021; Teaching Artist, STEAM Summer Academy 2019 - 2023; Lindsay Community School 2019 - 2021; Graffiti Zone 2013; City Year, Harper High School 2012-13
High School
RESEARCH
Research Interests: Performance Studies, Devised Theatre, Theatre of the Oppressed, Participatory and Community-Engaged Research, Critical Race Theory, Childhood Studies, Civic Engagement
My research explores how theatre and performance can help youth and communities understand their experiences, examine social problems, and take a more active role in shaping their communities and institutions. I am especially interested in participatory forms of theatre, storytelling, and community-based research that allow people to move from being observers to becoming active participants, researchers, and decision-makers.
At the heart of this work is a larger question about power: Who is given the freedom to speak, experiment, make mistakes, and be recognized as fully human? This question also guides my research on childhood, particularly the ways race shapes who is allowed the protections and possibilities we associate with being a child.
My research examines how Black children are often denied the protections associated with childhood. Drawing on the work of Victor Turner, I think about childhood as a time when young people are generally expected to experiment, make mistakes, play, and grow.
But that freedom is not given equally to all children.
In conversation with Frank B. Wilderson III and Afro-pessimism, I explore how anti-Blackness shapes these differences through law, literature, performance, and film, influencing whose innocence, vulnerability, and future are protected.
I do not argue that theatre alone can solve these problems. Instead, performance can help make visible the beliefs, behaviors, and institutional practices that often go unquestioned. It can create a space for people to examine how power works, challenge assumptions, and imagine different possibilities.
My current work continues to explore theatre as a tool for civic learning, career development, community-engaged research, and institutional change. I am especially interested in creating meaningful ways for young people and historically excluded communities to participate in research, policy, and decision-making—not simply as people being studied, but as researchers, artists, thinkers, and civic leaders themselves.
Selected Publications
Teshome, T. (2024). Pilot Project Report on Youth Voice in San Diego Juvenile Justice Facilities [Restricted report]. Superior Court of California, San Diego Juvenile Justice Commission.
Teshome, T. (Contributor). (2024). Helping First-Generation Students Succeed: Psychologically Backed Strategies for Campus and Classroom. Psychology of Teaching Society.
Teshome, T. (Contributor). (2022). Detroit Coordinated Community Plan Development to End Youth Homelessness. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Youth Homelessness Demonstration Program.
Teshome, T. (2019). From Pursuing to Ensuing Innocence: How Performance can Empower Youth to Access and Establish Shared Governance in Juvenile Justice [Doctoral Dissertation].
Teshome, T., & Yang, K. W. (2018). Not Child but Meager: Sexualization and Negation of Black Childhood. Small Axe, 22(3), 160–170.
Teshome, T. (2018). Black plight in flight. In K. A. Perkins, S. L. Richards, R. A. Craft, & T. F. DeFrantz (Eds.), The Routledge companion to African American theatre and performance (pp. 291-294). Routledge.