Innovative Secondary Teaching Fellowship Completes Successful Fourth Year

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ARTeacher Fellows combine the arts with classroom curriculum for richer and deeper learning experiences.

BENTONVILLE — What happens when you bring music, dance, theatre and visual arts into English, history and science classrooms? This past school year, 25 Northwest Arkansas teachers demonstrated the answer: something very special.

The teachers were all participants in the ARTeacher Fellowship program, an initiative of the University of Arkansas Center for Children and Youth, in partnership with Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and the Walton Arts Center. The Fellowship selects 10 high school and junior high school teachers annually to undertake up to three years of professional development in integrating the arts into core classrooms. This May concluded the program's fourth year of operation.

"The ARTeacher Fellowship is one of the most rewarding parts of my job," said Hung Pham, director of the Center for Children and Youth. "Getting to work with talented educators to creatively expand and hone their pedagogy — it's awesome to see."

For three days during the summer and then throughout the school year, the ARTeacher Fellows attend full-day workshops to learn arts integration practices from nationally recognized specialists, as well as to share their own classroom experiences. Teachers tie dance to physics, photography with English, and theatre with social studies, facilitating richer and deeper learning experiences for students.   

The program's impact has been significant.

"ARTeacher has profoundly expanded and reshaped my philosophy of teaching," said Justin Knapp of Bentonville High School. "The strategies I learned in our training throughout the year enabled me to engage and teach students in new ways."

Knapp shared an example where his students, inspired by classroom activity, organized a community-wide poetry event on their own at a local café with over 40 performers.

"I was blown away by the level of talent displayed that night," he said.

Springdale High School teacher Jennifer Kinder highlighted the power of arts to connect with students of challenging backgrounds.

"One of my new arrival refugees had been completely silent upon entering my class," said Kinder. "The traumatic events he experienced had a large toll on his ability to express himself verbally. Arts integration has given him the support he needs to showcase what he knows about our content in ways in which he has previously struggled. It's helped him build confidence, all the while mastering the language skills needed to be successful."

"Many teachers have shared with me that the ARTeacher Fellowship is one of the most meaningful experiences of their life, both personally and professionally," said Laura Goodwin, vice president of learning and engagement at the Walton Arts Center. Goodwin has been with the ARTeacher program since its inception. "Each Fellow contributes to making the Fellowship the experience we've come to know and love."

Upon successful completion of the yearlong professional development, Fellows are eligible to continue with the Fellowship for a second and third year. During these additional years, Fellows are encouraged to share their knowledge and receive support to lead workshops at their school, present at state and national conferences, or publish scholarly writing.

Fayetteville High School teacher Nathan Strayhorn recently completed his third and final year with the ARTeacher Fellowship program.

Said Strayhorn, "One of the things I appreciate the most about the ARTeacher experience is that in each of our sessions, we were exposed to professionals in the field; better yet, we were treated as professionals ourselves."

Drawing from his experiences with ARTeacher, Strayhorn recently co-authored an article with U of A associate professor Chris Goering, which was published in the May 2016 issue of The English Journal.

As the ARTeacher Fellowship plans for the upcoming school year, Pham sees opportunities for the program to grow and improve.

"There are schools who've had teachers take part in the Fellowship and are now looking into doing ARTeacher for their whole departments," he said. "We've also been exploring ways to expand the program beyond Northwest Arkansas."

The program, he says, can serve as a model for others.

"With the ARTeacher program, we're committed to providing teachers with top-notch pedagogical training, treating them as professional colleagues, and sustaining support of their work over an extended period — because deep change takes time."