Secondary art teachers are using social media as a gallery to exhibit the work of their students.

In an effort to promote the program, the district art teachers collaborated to come up with ideas to showcase their students and their artwork.

They now have a dedicated Facebook page to feature the creations to show the public how talented the students are, as well as to raise awareness of the importance of the fine arts.

“Social media is a great platform to allow parents a glimpse of all the amazing artwork that our students are doing,” Southard art teacher Alicia Buda said. “By having a consistent platform for parents to be involved in, it creates a greater community awareness of all the hard work our teachers and students do.”

These platforms will also help elevate the PISD art program to a new level.

“The visual arts department has been working toward qualifying for the District of Dis-tinction award from the Texas Art Education Association,” Lovelady Art 1 teacher Lindsey Shirley said. “Part of that requires us to have a social media presence showcasing student art and what we are doing in the classroom. Programs with the level of distinction we hope to achieve have active social media pages, and this is one step of many we are taking to bring improvements to our program.”

The creators see this Facebook presence as a new opportunity.

“By posting all the great things happening throughout the district, it can inspire more community involvement and students can proudly display their work,” Mrs. Buda said. “We are excited to continue posting all our events and work throughout the district to keep our parents and local community involved in supporting our amazing art program.”  

The Princeton ISD Visual Arts Department Facebook page is https://www.facebook.com/PISDVisualArts

To debut the page, Southard featured student art that would be showcased in the recent district art show.

“Southard worked really hard in creating pieces to display along with the high school,” Mrs. Buda said. “Students worked on key art concepts and composed some amazing art pieces for the community to enjoy.”

For Lovelady’s first post, Emily Bowman’s Visual Journaling Club explored a variety of me-diums and techniques in their sketchbooks, followed by a post about Ms. Shirley’s class working on a collaborative paper quilt and Ms. Bowman’s students recreating popular snack wrappers inspired by the Pop Art movement.

These projects were highlighted because they wanted to promote the district’s first-ever holiday art show, which is something they want to make a tradition.

In addition, the art show served as a fundraiser for the program with several pieces of handmade artwork for sale at the event.

The art show exhibited student work, but they say social media is another way to get their pieces in front of the public.

“I have been drawing since I was little, so it is cool to have that,” Lovelady 9th-grader Jahir Ascencio Rivera said.

Nour Hasan agreed.

“It’s nice being able to show our art and creative skills,” said Nour, a Lovelady Art 1 student.

The art teachers and students have big plans for utilizing the social media platform.

“Our plan is to post weekly and use this as a way to celebrate our students as they work hard in class and branch out to art competitions and philanthropy,” Ms. Shirley said. “We want to have a well-documented history of the department as it grows and changes over the next few years.”

By Jean Ann Collins, Princeton ISD

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