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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAllen Academy Art Teacher Appreciationrfhe E Bryan -College Station, Texas * theeagle. WEDNESDAY May 8, 2019 $2.00 4COM roadenwing their horizons Ben Academy's Easterling sees art as way to see beyond `comfort zones' By CHELSEA KATZ chelsea.katz@theeagle.com Xp fter spending a cou- le years behind a esk as a graphic designer, Jennifer Easter- ling decided she needed a hange and found her pas - ion in teaching. "The rewards of teach- g, as far as getting to teract with the kids, and etting to know them on a rPerent level and helping assions, pu sh them to find their r that's what does she said. "Thinking if were to step outside the APPRECIATION classroom, I don't know what I would do." Easterling, the middle school and upper school art teacher at Allen Academy, Eagle photo by Laura McKenzie See EASTERLING, Page A3 Jennifer Easterling has been an art teacher at Allen Academy for three years. itor's note: In recognition of National Teacher Appreciation Month, The Eagle will be profiling area teachers throughout the month of May. If you would like suggest a teacher for a future profile, email newsC@theeagle.com. � EASTERLING: Says she wants students to appreciate art Continued from Al has now been working in education for 10 years. One of her goals is to get the students to learn to ap- preciate art and to get them to explore outside of their comfort zone. Since 2018, Easterling, who has worked at Allen Academy for three years, has overseen the Al- len Explorers program, in which a group of students travel to another country for a week or so. "My big thing is, and what I've done with the international travel and stuff, is using the world as their classroom," she said. "There are things that we learn here, and then taking those skills and applying them wherever else we may be or gaining skills from a living work- ing artist.... Putting them out there and learning form other people, not just me sitting in a classroom lecturing and seeing how other people are apply- ing those skills and how somebody's able to make a living out of it or even a lifetime." When students leave her class, Easterling said, she just wants them to have an appreciation for art. "Art may not be your forte or your thing; you may not do it all of your life or you might in which I'd love to see that too, but if you can at least ap- preciate it and understand what people are doing and why they're doing it," she said. Senior Kendall Kacal said Easterling brought a different energy to the art room, noting the previous teacher had a much more structured classroom. "You get a lot of freedom when you're able to work underneath her," Kacal said. "You're still able to learn the techniques and all the new things ... but I've been able to do crazy projects and just explore my own personal- ity and style through art and learn about myself through learning through different art and finding my style by her teaching us her passion for it." Though it is an art room, Easterling said, therapy sessions sometimes come out of the class. "There are a lot of life lessons that, I think, hap- pen in here," she said. "We chat about all kinds of things when kids are work- ing on stuff. We have all kinds of, I guess, therapy sessions. It's fun because you do get to know the kids on a whole new level than if you're just up lecturing because you work and you chat and solve all of life's problems." Kacal said those chats are some of her favorite things about Easterling's class. "We talk a lot, just about family, about school. I've been at this school for 15 years, so I give her some context about why things are the way they are som times.... Me and her al- ways have really deep coi versations about anythin really, what's going on, our interests. A lot about life," she said. "It just brings a sense of, we call the `Allen Family,' and st. definitely brought that. I don't know if she expectE to be immersed into the family that Allen is, but i is a family, and she fits in perfectly here." That comfort Kacal ha; talking to Easterling and her other teachers is a skill, she said, she knows will help her as she movE on to college and beyond.