By Alysha Benejan
CCC Journalism Program
BLACKWOOD – Assistant Professor Allison Green is not just a professor at Camden County College, she is also an actress who has been in more than 140 plays in her more than four decades of being an actress.
Green is from a small town in Western Massachusetts called Wilbraham, where she attended Minnechaug Regional High School. At the age of 13, Green started to act professionally at the Barter Theatre. Green later attended New York University, Tisch School of Arts, where she received her bachelor of fine arts degree in 1978 in drama, undergraduate conjunction with The Stella Adler Conservatory of Acting, and also received her master of arts degree.
When asked what struck her passion for acting, Green said, “My mother read a book called ‘Margery Morning Star’ and she’s convinced that the vibrations of the story about wanting to be an actress reached the baby, and I came out acting.”
As a child, Green would pretend to be a nurse, a mommy, a doctor or teacher but these personas would have their own names and full histories. She was always acting as someone else and giving her personas life. She has been acting and involved in acting ever since.
Green has taught at many universities on the East Coast. Green said she has always liked to teach. “My father always said when you’re given gifts, you have a responsibility to share back,” Green said. She has been teaching since 1978.
Green was working nationally and internationally and traveling many miles a week. In 1989, she started as an adjunct at Camden County College. Green accepted the job at CCC because she was tired of traveling many miles at the age of 50 and ready for a change. The courses that she taught were acting, speech and diction, and theatre appreciation. In 2007, Green became an assistant professor and coordinator for performing and communication arts, artistic director of the Readers’ Theatre Project and is teaching public speaking and oral interpretation.
Green started the Readers’ Theatre Project in 2007. She has also started two new courses. They are production assistant, where the student can get an academic certification (FLM.CT), and film and television production, where the student can receive an associate in applied sciences degree (FLM.AAS). Production assistant is also a career ladder.
Green is also updating and upgrading both theaters in Lincoln Hall.