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Hello and welcome to the 2025 Signature in the Schools production.

Failure, reflection and success are interconnected forces that shape our world, driving personal growth and innovation. In today’s fiercely unforgiving society, failure is frequently seen as an endpoint. Yet, it is actually perhaps the most valuable teacher. Failure challenges us to confront our limitations, reimagine our goals and question our assumptions. It is not a sign of weakness but an invitation to learn and evolve.

Success, then, becomes more than the absence of failure—it becomes the ability to adapt, persevere and innovate in the face of adversity. It’s measured not by the avoidance of setbacks but by the capacity to rebound stronger and wiser. In a world where uncertainty and complexity are constants, embracing failure as a stepping stone and valuing reflection as a skill are essential for thriving.

We invite you to explore the world of Failureland with your students before and after you engage with the production. Each of the sections below provides a full multimedia experience: articles, lesson plans, images and more!

These exercises may be used in many capacities; they do not have to be used in a particular order or in correlation with one another. If there is a resource that is a good match for your curriculum, we hope that you will use it as a supplementary activity. Each article and exercise is deliberately developed to align with goals from the Virginia Standards of Learning (SOLs) for English, Social Studies and Theatre Arts.

The exercises and articles were created by a team of educators and theatrical professionals. Each section includes post-show discussion questions that can be used as inspiration for class discussion or as essay prompts.

Additionally, we hope that you will share the student website for the production with your students. Their website includes videos, articles and images from a wide variety of sources to immerse students in the world of Failureland and its relevance to the material they study with you as well as to their own lives. To visit the student website, click here

For more information and questions please reach out to the team at: sigschools@sigtheatre.org.

You can find the linked materials referenced in lessons here. You will also find relevant hyperlinks to specific resources when they are mentioned.