Theatrical lighting is based off the idea that every night it will be the same. Period. End of story. The blocking is set, the script is set, the lighting is set, the sound cues are set, and so on.
Broadway light ops sit and push the go button just like the rest of us, they are not charged with any artistic jobs. They just push the button when the SM tells them to, and the SM tells them to based on when the actor says whatever line or does whatever physical move the
Q is taken off of.
Thats not to say that its not good to be able to be able to override the system. I've grabed faders and run manual fade times when the actors are moving with a ML or two
tracking them. In theory, this should be set so the actor moves at the same speed every night though.
In a high school setting this is difficult, because you have the teacher and the student and the director all thinking they know everything, and all wanting to do it there way, and its very difficult to say "No, I'm the lighting designer, I'm looking at the stage and what your telling me to do is dumb and ugly. I want to do it my way and make it pretty and effective".