The Catalyst Collaborative at MIT (CC@MIT) is a collaboration between MIT and Underground Railway Theater at the Central Square Theater, which brings together theater artists and scientists to create and present plays that deepen public understanding of science and technology.
Through performances and post-show conversations with scientists and artists, CC@MIT:
- engages audiences in thinking about themes in science and technology of social and ethical concern;
- provides insight into the culture of science and the impact of that culture on our society;
- examines the human condition through the lens of science and technology
CC@MIT in the Community:
- Commissions playwrights and scientists to create new works together
- Collaborates with the Cambridge Science Festival and MIT Museum
- Stages readings of plays in the community, followed by conversations with scientists and artists
- Engages students through internships and science theater courses
- Conducts a youth apprenticeship project mentoring under-served teenagers with scientists and artists
- Creates professional development workshops for teachers and new curricular materials for youth and children
Special Ticket rates for MIT students.
Catalyst Collaborative at MIT Advisory Board
| Co Directors | |
| Janet Sonenberg | Section Head, Music & Theater Arts, MIT |
| Debra Wise | Artistic Director, Underground Railway Theater |
| Alan Brody | Playwright, Professor of Theater, MIT |
| Artistic Team | |
| Alan Lightman | Author, Physicist, Professor of Science Writing, MIT |
| Jon Lipsky | Playwright, Director, Professor of Theater, Boston University |
| Advisory Committee | |
| Philip Khoury | Director of the Advisory Committee, Associate Provost, MIT |
| Claude Canizares | Associate Provost, MIT Bruno Rossi Professor of Physics, MIT |
| Robert Desimone | Director, McGovern Institute for Brain Research Doris and Dawn Berkey Professor of Neuroscience, MIT |
| John Durant | Director, MIT Museum |
| Jerome Friedman | Institute Professor of Physics Emeritus, MIT 1990 Nobel Laureate |
| Owen Gingerich | Professor Emeritus of Astronomy and History of Science, Harvard University |
| Nancy Hopkins | Amgen, Inc. Professor of Biology, MIT |
| Robert L. Jaffe | MIT Morningstar Professor of Physics MacVicar Faculty Fellow, MIT |
| Leila Kinney | Director of Arts Initiatives Office of the Associate Provost, MIT |
| Natalie Kuldell | Biological Engineering, MIT Coalition for the Public Understanding of Science (COPUS) |
| Alan Guth | Cosmologist, Weisskopf Professor of Physics, MIT |
| Irene Porro | Director, Youth Astronomy Program MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research |
| Kate Snodgrass | Artistic Director, Boston Playwrights Theatre |
| Jason Weeks | Executive Director, Cambridge Arts Council |
| Honorary Member | |
| Eric Lander | Director, Broad Institute of MIT & Harvard CoChair, President Obama’s Advisory Council on Science and Technology |
