ADVOCACY

Debi West

I’ve spent the past thirty-four years as a teacher of the visual arts. Years ago, I steered our curriculum and our National Art Honor Society students onto a service-learning path. We created “art with purpose,” realizing that our talents and skills can help others.

I retired from the classroom in 2017 and now work part-time at Sea Pines Montessori Academy in Hilton Head, South Carolina. I teach eight hours a week across three days and have the privilege of working with pre-K to sixth-grade students. I wanted to start up an art club, so this year, my third to sixth graders considered the idea of what an art club that helps others should be called and, even more importantly, what its members should do.

Service learning needs to be a part of our visual art curricula because our students need to know that they can absolutely make a difference.

The A.R.T. Club
Together, we came up with the A.R.T. Club, an acronym for the “altruistic response team.” Just like that, we found the perfect name. Now we needed a few after-school projects that would reflect our responses to local and global issues.

The first project involved writing art-filled letters of love to Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia, following a school shooting.

Next, we created pinwheels for peace to exhibit in the front of the school, and then we painted rocks with encouraging symbols and messages for our upcoming Kindness Rocks garden.

And then, sadly, hurricanes hit the southeast, and we knew we had to do something to help friends and art departments in Augusta, Georgia, and Asheville, North Carolina. As we pondered what to do, one of my third graders said she loved coloring books, and there it was, the answer to our question! Each student created two pages to go into our twenty-two page collaborative coloring books. These pages were filled with love and light. I went to our local Staples, and the manager there graciously printed up fifty of these books, and we sold them for $10 donations. All the money will go to help art programs in Augusta and Asheville. That is what our altruistic response team is all about—helping others.

Service Learning Impact
Service learning needs to be a part of our visual art curricula because our students need to know that they can absolutely make a difference.

Next we’ll create beautiful “heARTworks” to display at a local retirement home, and then we plan to make animal pins to help raise money for our local humane society.
I hope these projects jumpstart ideas for your own altruistic response team. What are your students doing to be the change they want to see in the world? I’d love to hear from you!

Debi West is a part-time art teacher at Sea Pines Montessori Academy in Hilton Head, South Carolina. dewestudio@gmail.com