Art Education professor and students win at conference

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Katie Gibson and Kasey Hare present their lesson plan featuring the book "Zoom" by Istvan Banyai. This is for grade levels sixth through eight.

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Chloe Christ shares "Wave" by Suzy Lee, along with a lesson plan for first graders.

Richard Bay awoke Nov. 7 at the 2014 Virginia Art Educator Association Conference to find himself not only a conference presenter and proud professor to a group of student participants, but also an award winner.

Bay, professor of Art Education at RU, along with several of his students attended the conference Nov. 6-8 in Midlothian, Virginia.

His session, “Scribble, Marks, Draw, and Then…Development of the Whole Child,” was created to provide teachers with a forum to discuss child development in today’s digital climate. Bay presented several sections, covering how children know the world and experience it, how teachers can learn more about this, and included a question and answer period.

“We ended with a section on special needs students, their work and interpretations of it, as well as anomalies to the typical cycles we see,” Bay said, “I ended with an idea to help teachers open more doors to their students’ own information. This included an assessment piece. It was a wonderful afternoon.”

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A conference-goers favorite – Julia Poyerpresented her lesson plan for second graders featuring "Trainstop" by Barbra Lehman.

“Books Without Words – Creative & Exciting Ideas for the Classroom” was the title of his students’ session, which Bay moderated. The students who participated were Julia Proyer (president of the RU student chapter of VAEA), Ashley Colston, Chloe Crist, Taylor Downey, Katie Gibson, Kasey Hare and Shana Parnell.

In preparation for their presentation, the students created lesson plans based around picture books for different grade levels.

“Many teachers complimented the students and told them it was one of their favorite and most informative session. For all of students this was their first conference experience and I feel it was incredibly successful,” Bay said.

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Maripat Hyatt, president of the VAEA, with Dr. Richard Bay and his award.

And as if such accolades were not enough, Bay received the Southwest Region Higher Education Division Art Educator Award during the Nov. 7 awards breakfast.

When the Southwest region of the association presented their award, they began by reading a letter from Dr. Joseph Scartelli. He is the former dean of the CVPA and a music therapy professor at RU. His letter was a reference for Bay’s nomination.

The letter discussed Bay’s teaching history at RU, but also described a program Bay created with the Radford City Schools. Select art education students have the opportunity to provide art classes for first and second grade students, which are difficult for the school system to provide on its own.

“To see these very young students so engaged, enthusiastic, and joyful is truly inspiring. Bay’s college students work directly with the young students in a large class setting providing them with invaluable pre-professional experiences”, Scartelli’s said.

Bay believes two former students nominated him for the award.

Melissa Humphrey Fernall, president of the Southwest region presented the award along with a gift bag to Bay.

Bay is a long-term member of the National Art Educator Association and has 13 years of active membership with the VAEA.

For more information about the RU art education program visit www.radford.edu/content/cvpa/home/art/programs/undergraduate/art-education.html. To learn about the VAEA, go to www.vaea.org.

Nov 20, 2014
CVPA
540-831-6237
cvpa411@radford.edu