Sheila Kerrigan is a performer, director, author, and teacher who works in schools, with at-risk youth, and in community settings. As co-director of TOUCH Mime Theater for 17 years, she toured the eastern US, performing and conducting residencies and workshops. With TOUCH she collaboratively created twenty original performances. She has conducted residencies for arts councils and universities, performed and taught in prisons, juvenile detention centers, hospitals, in corporate settings, street festivals, and on television. She has directed original plays for Jelly Educational Theater, a professional, adult company that performs issue-oriented plays for children. She has developed curricula… that use mime and theater games to teach fundamental life skills like cooperation (leading and following) communication (focusing, seeing, listening, self-awareness and responding) creative thinking and collaboration. While researching for The Performer's Guide to the Collaborative Process, she interviewed over seventy creative collaborators and studied group facilitation, mediation, and conflict resolution. She has developed a theater-based curriculum around these skills. She holds a certificate in conflict management from the Center for Peace Education. She is a member of Alternate ROOTS, and serves on the ROOTS Resources for Social Change Training Team.