Westminster Christian School senior Olivia Barrellier has been a triple fine arts major and is a full-on theater kid.
“I’ve been in drama since sixth grade,” she says. “I joined Thespians as soon as I could. I was one of the few freshmen to be inducted.”
She was also in Junior Thespians in middle school and is now in the Westminster Theater Club as well as the International Thespians Society.
Over her high school career, Olivia has been in 16 plays so far – number 17 will be her role in Lion King this spring.
She’s gone to district and state competitions and received superior ratings in pantomime, large group musicals and monologues.
Her theater work includes behind the scenes jobs.
“I’ve always been on the stage and I wanted to try backstage work,” she says. “I was stage manager with a friend. We ran the backstage coordination. It’s just as much work as being on stage.”
When she’s not in rehearsals or acting on stage, she tries to volunteer. She volunteered for two years at the Miami Learning Experience, a school for children and young adults with special needs.
“I’d get there when the students were released from class so I helped in aftercare,” she says. “We’d read books, and do some dancing.”
She loved the experience. She says on her first day, she was a tad nervous but then one little boy jumped on her to give her a huge hug which helped her feel welcome.
Barrellier went as often as she could on Thursdays.
“I had to balance that with rehearsals and cheerleading,” she said.
Her volunteer work includes two Blue Missions trips to the Dominican Republic. The first took place the summer going into her junior year, then again last summer.
“The first trip, my classmates and I built pit latrines to provide sanitation to the village,” she says. “The second trip, we built an aqueduct.”
On that trip, they went on a seven-hour hike – four hours there and three hours back.
“That was the most challenging day of my life,” she says. “We were on all fours going up the mountains and then sliding down on our backs. It was so mentally and physical draining.”
She says everyone ran out of water the first two hours of the hike.
“We couldn’t drink water when we got to the source because we were used to having clean water,” she says. “Our counselors wanted us to see what these people had to go through just to have a sip of water.”
When they did finish the work and the water ran through the pipes, everyone was thrilled.
“For most of the villagers, it was their first time having clean water,” she says.
The first year, Barrellier went reluctantly. The second year, she was so enthusiastic she convinced her younger brother to go.
“They were so impactful to me. Giving back is so much better than receiving,” she says.
“You make someone smile, or provide them access to clean water. It’s the greatest feeling.”
Barrellier plans to study communications and a minor in theater in college. She’s been accepted to Loyola Marymount, Marymount Manhattan and Florida International University.
She’s waiting to hear from American University in Washington, D.C., New York University, the University of Central Florida, and Catholic University, and Emerson.
She is a French native speaker so she applied to a couple of universities in Canada, McGill and Concordia.
“I was born and raised between Paris, France and Geneva, Switzerland,” she says.
Linda Rodriguez Bernfeld
