The theatre department will be well represented at the DSM High School Musical Theatre Awards program Thursday at Music Hall at Fair Park as several students and the school’s orchestra program are up for awards.

“They invite high schools from all over North Texas area and central Texas to compete in high school musical competition,” theatre director Heather Willingham said. “They send three judges to each school and there’s, I think over a hundred judges that they use that are all professionals in the industry and they judge you on design, on acting, on singing, on dancing, on all of these things, and then they come up with different nominations based on all of the shows they’ve seen.”

The Dallas Summer Musicals High School Musical Theatre Awards is the second largest program of its kind in the country, with the Best Actor & Actress winners receiving an all-expense paid trip to New York City where they represent DSM HSMTA in the National High School Musical Theatre Awards at the Minskoff Theater on Broadway.

“I am absolutely thrilled to be nominated,” senior and Best Actress nominee Grace Raber said. “It has been a dream of mine since freshman year and I’m so blessed to be able to work with these amazing people. I’ve been in theatre since I was five. I remember going to DSM since before that to see shows. I vividly remember looking up at the stage and saying that I would one day perform on that big stage. So I have taken dance classes, acting classes, voice lessons, participated in countless musicals, and many other things.”

In addition to Raber’s nomination, sophomore Kyle Strickland is nominated for Scenic Design and Lighting Design, with orchestra director Julie Blackstock and the orchestra up for Best Student Orchestra.“We would love to win,” Willingham said. “But every year it’s really just trying to get our fine arts department to be more and more integrated in a way that more recognition is received upon not just the theatre department, but all of fine arts at Liberty High School.”