To the Members of the Tres Vidas Production:
I am writing on behalf of several faculty and staff members here at Black Hills State University to express our great appreciation for your visit and to communicate, if possible, the awe and wonderment we felt at your production.
As a small university in a rural area of South Dakota, we are always seeking ways to give our students diverse cultural experiences. Our decision to bring Tres Vidas to campus was based in large part on its potential appeal to a variety of interest groups, such as Women’s Studies, Latin American Studies, Spanish, and, of course Music and Theater. We were also impressed be the marketing video you had sent us but it did not prepare us for the electricity of the performance. Everything about your visit far exceeded our expectations.
The audience that evening, reduced in size by bad weather, comprised mostly of tired faculty and students, many of them there under duress, simply came alive with an excitement that didn’t want throughout the entire performance. You gave us a knockout performance, as if you had been performing in front of thousands. Thank you.
As a professor of Spanish, I would like to add that my students will remember the stories of these three remarkable Latin American women as a result of having experienced them, something they could never get in the classroom. Karina Barros inhabits each of these personalities to such a degree that without being told, one would never guess that it was the same actress each time. What a talent! And that can be said of the musicians also; the entire performance is simply splendid. My students loved it, as did everyone I talked to afterwards.
We would also like to that Michael Parola for the enthusiasm with which he lectured to classes in the College of Business. Faculty who heard the lecture felt that he conveyed valuable information and feedback from the students was very positive. “He was great” was the report from one faculty member.
Again, thank you for such a terrific performance and visit to our campus. If a reference is ever requested from another university, please give them my contact information.
— Peggy Buckwalter, Black Hills State University (SD)