Two Kansas University graduate scenography students won major awards at the Region V Festival of the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, which was last month in Fargo, N.D., and Moorhead, Minn.

Robbie Jones, Garden City third-year student, was awarded the Barbizon Award for Set Design, the highest award Region V presents to a student designer. As the Barbizon winner, Jones receives a trip to Washington, D.C., for the KCACTF National Festival, where his scenic design for University Theatre’s fall production of “Popcorn” will be entered in the national set design competition. Jones also received the first-place set design award for his design for “The Fantasticks,” one of the summer productions staged by Kansas Repertory Theatre in 2005.

Sandy Appleoff, Fall City, Neb., graduate student, won first place in the graduate division in the regional costume design competition for her design of the opera “Turandot.”

Two KU theater students were selected to perform in the semi-final round of the Irene Ryan Acting Competition. Dianne-Yvette Cook, Lawrence senior, and Justin Knudsen, Lakeville, Minn., senior, were selected from 290 participants in the acting competition. Both appeared in the fall production “Three Sisters.”

The University Theatre/English Alternative Theatre co-production of “An Army of One” by 2005 graduate Zacory Boatright, was “very well-received” at the festival, according to John Staniunas, artistic director of the University Theatre. It will not advance further in competition.