Raue Center School for the Arts hires new director of education

The Raue Center’s School for the Arts hired Robin Irwin as its director of education and cultural partnerships, according to a news release.

“I am beyond excited to be returning to Crystal Lake – the place where my lifelong love affair with the performing arts began,” the Crystal Lake native said in a statement. “The understanding that the arts are essential to the life of a community has been baked into the DNA of the Raue Center for the Arts since its founding. I look forward to joining the exceptional staff of the Raue in furthering that goal and to helping guide the next generation of artist-citizens to find that theater and arts skills are life skills.”

Irwin appeared in the original Broadway cast of the Tony award-winning “Titanic” and its subsequent national tour, according to the release. Other credentials include the Broadway productions of “Grease!” and “Dance of the Vampires.”

She has been a featured soloist with symphonies all over the world and has been an instructor at New York University’s Tisch School for the Arts, the New York Film Academy and Montclair State University, according to the release.

As director of education at Luna Stage, she built in-school residencies and was the producing artistic director of Montclair State University’s professional development programming and for the Foxy Awards for six years.

For the past several years, Irwin was founding executive director of the Appalachian Center for the Arts, a full service arts center in Eastern Kentucky.