SENE Film, Music and Arts Festival Don Bio

Don Farias is the Producing Director and co-founder of the SENE Film, Music and Arts Festival. Prior to founding SENE, Don was the Managing Director with the Rhode Island International Film Festival (RIIFF). He joined RIIFF’s Film Traffic department as a volunteer in 2003 and became the Film Traffic Manager in 2004 where he assisted with RIIFF’s Filmmaker Master Class and ScriptBiz screenplay seminar. Don became the Programming Director in 2006 where he managed the screening, judging and selection process for over 1,500 films. In 2006 and 2007, RIIFF screened over 300 films during the annual week-long event. In 2007, Don was named the Managing Director of the festival. In addition, he was an Award’s Judge for the 2007 Artists’ Exchange Annual Short Film Festival; a festival for New England filmmakers. Don volunteers with local PATV shows, has developed promotional video scripts for local businesses, is a writer, songwriter, musician and has assisted in the making of an independent feature film.

Prior to his involvement with SENE, Don was an independent computer consultant and worked at Bryant University managing a global education program, training high school students and faculty. While at Bryant, Don gained experience in video telecommunications, database technology, events management and training. He has been a substitute teacher, a senior systems analyst with MetLife and managed the Trident Submarine Engineering Technology team for General Dynamics. He has also been involved with his town’s School Committee Technology Goals team, the Glocester Schools Certificate of Mastery Implementation Team, the Glocester School Accountability for Learning and Teaching program, and the National Academy of Finance Advisory Board with the Smithfield school district. Don attended Pennsylvania State University, Bryant University, the University of New Haven Graduate School and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.