Art Education

Art Education Fundamentals

The Art Education program in the Mary Schiller Myers School of Art consists of a core curriculum of theory and practice that prepares students to work in a variety of organizational settings, from museums to recreational centers.

Purpose

The purpose of this program is to enable students to develop the range of knowledge, skills, and competencies expected of those holding a liberal-arts baccalaureate degree in art and professional preparation in art education. P, K-12 licensed school art teachers who graduate from this program are expected to exhibit a high level of skills as artists, designers, and educators. Students benefit from excellent art, history, and theory instruction, and professionally equipped art and technology studios, while obtaining licensure from the School of Education through highly academic and interactive coursework.

Goals

The following basic goals/competencies are essential to all prospective art teachers:

To foster competencies with the basic expressive, technical, procedural and organizational skills, and conceptual insights developed through studio art and design experiences.
To facilitate an understanding of the major styles and periods of art history, analytical methods, and theories of criticism.
To help students connect an understanding of educational processes and structures with an understanding of relationships among the arts, sciences, and humanities, in order to apply art competencies in teaching situations and to integrate art/design instruction into the total process of education.
To assist teachers in developing the knowledge and skills to customize and differentiate learning for learners with a range of individual differences. To aid pre-service teachers in developing curricular, instructional, and assessment strategies for building 21st Century cross-disciplinary skills for K-12 students (communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and the use of technology).
To help students develop effective assessment strategies for collecting data and using it to improve instruction and support learner success.

Art Education Faculty

Elisa Gargarella
Title: Associate Professor, Art Education Area Coordinator
Dept/Program: Art Education
Phone: 330–972–8325
Email: gelisa@uakron.edu

Distinctions

Students are presented with a broad range of facilities and opportunities while pursuing their BA in Art Education such as:

Gain hands on experience working with diverse student populations in clinical experiences.
Exhibit in shows both within the university and beyond in regional venues.
Opportunities to network through the Ohio Art Education Association.
Participate in Arts LIFT (award winning community based art education program) and other University sponsored outreach initiatives.
Participate in International study abroad opportunities led by art education faculty every three years.

Sample Curriculum:

Art Education - B.A.

Arts LIFT

The goal of the Arts LIFT apprenticeship program funded by the Lola K. Isroff Arts Assistance Endowed Fund is to give students an opportunity to work with professional artists, while also participating in civic engagement. Exposing youth to public issues through art for increasing their sense of agency for urban regeneration is an ongoing goal of the Arts LIFT program.

Arts LIFT is a community based arts education program that brings together urban high school students, practicing artists and teachers, and community organizations with an interest in cultural renewal. Through this collaboration, students create an art installation in a public space. In its several years of active programming, Arts-LIFT participants have created nine major installations that are functionally utilized or visited annually by thousands of people.