Melissa Smith Shine your light

Melissa Smith is the Founder and Executive Director of Backlight Productions, a theater arts program for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) in Middle TN. Backlight Productions creates professional-level performance opportunities for artists with IDD where they are featured in leading roles in quality productions, performing alongside industry professionals using their gifts to put someone else in the spotlight. Melissa is passionate about giving a spotlight to the disabilities community that is so often lost in the background in the arts community, and using all forms of the arts to encourage kindness, empathy, and inclusivity. Melissa is the creator of the Friends of Franklin County children's book series and the author of "The Great Changeup: My Friend with Autism". As a wife and mother, Melissa's work focuses on providing families with tools to spark conversations early on, acknowledging the realities of various disabilities, and seeing the beauty and power in our differences and the friendships that can be made between us.