Socioeconomic Flexibility: Neighborhood Education
What have you done to make your school or your community a better place? Socioeconomic flexibility should not define whether a student has access to explore art. Eliminating art from the majority of public school curricula positions art as a luxury available only to a few. I accept the responsibility of imparting my passion for art to students who lack this opportunity because I know how visual communication affirms identity.
I taught art every week for the past four years in low-income neighborhoods with the intention to link visual voice with personal narrative. My work with Neighborhood Arts to establish after-school art programs in six elementary and middle schools ultimately advocates for the public funding of the arts.
Every year,
my students react in two ways to a class that introduces foreign methods of thinking. Their initial lack of enthusiasm reveals the ubiquitous stigma against pursuing art and they hide their drawings with their hands because they feel ashamed. Students copy one another rather than confronting the process of practice. If I showcase an example of the project, I end with 30 identical versions. While I value their collaborative and social nature, I strive for each student to visualize her voice for herself, rather than succumb to a class consensus. I now pose open-ended prompts so that self-reflection and creation, not imitation is produced in all student work.
Since most of my students are the children of undocumented immigrants from Central America, I infuse cultural traditions into class projects and teach in Spanish. For Dia de Los Muertos, students commemorated a past figure in their lives by decorated a figuring in their name. Even though Ana said she takes my class solely because she has nowhere else to wait for her parents to finish work and initially did not participate, afterward approached me seeking spare markers and fabric so that she could reteach the project to her younger sisters. My work is only impactful when students can relate art to their own lives, and visualize existing experiences. My evolution as an artist mirrors my student's growth and stems from critiquing each step of my teaching, as the experiences that surround me compels me to act.
I taught art every week for the past four years in low-income neighborhoods with the intention to link visual voice with personal narrative. My work with Neighborhood Arts to establish after-school art programs in six elementary and middle schools ultimately advocates for the public funding of the arts.
Every year,
my students react in two ways to a class that introduces foreign methods of thinking. Their initial lack of enthusiasm reveals the ubiquitous stigma against pursuing art and they hide their drawings with their hands because they feel ashamed. Students copy one another rather than confronting the process of practice. If I showcase an example of the project, I end with 30 identical versions. While I value their collaborative and social nature, I strive for each student to visualize her voice for herself, rather than succumb to a class consensus. I now pose open-ended prompts so that self-reflection and creation, not imitation is produced in all student work.
Since most of my students are the children of undocumented immigrants from Central America, I infuse cultural traditions into class projects and teach in Spanish. For Dia de Los Muertos, students commemorated a past figure in their lives by decorated a figuring in their name. Even though Ana said she takes my class solely because she has nowhere else to wait for her parents to finish work and initially did not participate, afterward approached me seeking spare markers and fabric so that she could reteach the project to her younger sisters. My work is only impactful when students can relate art to their own lives, and visualize existing experiences. My evolution as an artist mirrors my student's growth and stems from critiquing each step of my teaching, as the experiences that surround me compels me to act.