Drew Peregoy isn’t the stereotypical drama teacher. The 2001 215-pound state champion wrestler from Rocky Mountain High School and offensive and defensive lineman seems a bit out of place sewing costumes, applying makeup, and teaching students how to act. But he’s tremendous at it.
“I had a football player in drama a couple of years ago, I told him, your offensive line coach is applying your eyeliner,” Peregoy said.
That’s the type of humor and classroom atmosphere that draws students to his classes at Shoshoni High School.
Peregoy grew up on the road, moving every few years, and sometimes during the school year. His parents divorced, and he lived with his father, who worked as a ranch hand. With stops in North Dakota, Thermopolis, and finally between Cowley and Lovell, Drew saw a lot of the west growing up.
While attending Central Wyoming College, he met his wife, April. April is from Big Piney. They were married in 2004 when Drew was 21.
“We would have been married the year before, but April was injured in a truck accident while hauling water,” Drew said.
April is the director of the Riverton Museum.
Drew taught kindergarten for 12 years. At 6-2 and 275 pounds, he’s not the stereotypical early childhood educator, but the kids loved him.
Shoshoni couldn’t find a music teacher after years of trying and had to offer a performing arts class to maintain accreditation.
That performing arts class came with Drew Peregoy teaching drama, media production, and set design. His classes are a mix of classical vocational education with high-tech, overshadowed by a healthy dose of acting, makeup, and set preparation.
He teaches Technical Theater, acting at the high school and middle school level, 8th-grade Technical Theater, and a high school and middle school section of a class called New Media.
He has an associate’s degree in theater from Central Wyoming, a BA in elementary education from Chadron State College and an MA in teaching and learning with technology.
As is the case with many Shoshoni CTE (Career and Technical Education) instructors, he has a PIC (Professional Instruction Certificate) to cover all the classes he teaches.
He’s also been an assistant football and wrestling coach, but now volunteers with those positions after he and April took in three children. They have guardianship of the three youngsters since July 2022.
A career in acting or set design might seem a long shot for students in rural Wyoming, but the legendary Johnny Carson hailed from a town similar to Shoshoni in Nebraska.
As far as career options go, there aren’t many for actors, but the digital world is the greatest level playing field ever invented.
Peregoy’s New Media students create unique videos and post them on social media.
“It’s a wide variety of camera work and working behind the scenes,” senior Andrew Garcia said.
Garcia hopes to work in Sports Broadcasting and has already done radio, covering the Wrangler football team.
“I really like it, because it’s more behind the scenes,” Madi Ramage said. “You have to have the vision in your head before it makes it to the screen.”
Corbin Brown is a star in the video production realm. He’s been outstanding in state competitions.
“I’ve competed the last three years,” Brown said. “I won my sophomore and junior year, back-to-back at state.”
Despite his success, Brown is going to major in business in college.
“I like to keep all the doors open,” he said.
His YouTube channel, “Director Corbs,” has 11 videos he’s produced and has a solid following.
The teaser on his YouTube channel is enticing.
“Step into a world where filmmaking meets passion. On this channel, I create influential short films and promotional videos that spotlight the journeys of artists and athletes. From dynamic storytelling to cinematic visuals, each video brings you to the heart of creativity and athleticism.”
Shoshoni High School is heavily dedicated to video production, and YouTube is its vehicle. Students in Josh McCoy’s computer science classes develop videos as does Rachel Rapp with her FBLA students.
Naysayers may look at video and digital production with a side eye, but it is the wave of the future, and it’s available to students in a variety of settings through Shoshoni’s innovative CTE curriculum.
With much of the world getting its news and entertainment on a cell phone, tablet, or computer, this is the communication of the present, and it will only grow in the future. The students at Shoshoni are riding the crest of the technological wave.
In a more traditional setting, Peregoy is the drama teacher, and his students produce plays for performance on the stage just outside his classroom near the commons area where students eat lunch each day.
“Acting is for everybody. There’s never anything wrong with being able to talk to people,” Peregoy said. “I want them to learn to problem solve. Let’s figure things out.”
While few if any of the students at Shoshoni High School plan on a Hollywood acting career, there are many more venues offered through a bit of skillful acting that open up in later life.
Currently his drama students are working a production of “Rotten Apples.”
“It’s like a game of Clue, but instead of Colonel Mustard, they play literary characters,” Peregoy said. “We use fairy tale villains in leading roles. Rumpelstiltskin is the main character in this play.”
The sight of a football and wrestling coach teaching students how to apply makeup, how to sew, and how to design sets to augment performances is far from run-of-the-mill education.
Thinking outside the box isn’t suggested; it’s a requirement at Shoshoni.
There is a difference in walking the halls that you can feel in Shoshoni when compared to other schools. The atmosphere is upbeat. The teachers share a can-do attitude, and the administration supports their efforts.
Peregoy is the epitome of outside-the-box. His humor and laid-back instructional technique is juxtaposed with his intensity on the sidelines and the mat.
It’s an effective mix, and the students from seventh grade to seniors all benefit from it.