Students display sculptures and film through decade-old BTS arts program

At a school event, students and their art educator presented projects created through the BTS arts program, which the educator said the school has hosted for 10 years.

The educator said the program aims to “bring the learning to life through the arts,” using creative projects to show what students have learned in class. “Our school has had the BTS arts program for 10 years and I've been the art educator here for 9,” the art educator said. “BTS arts is all about bringing the learning to life through the arts.”

Two students described individual projects. One student showed a sculpture of a flower with “like this bowl thing to it” and said the piece was made to hold jewelry: “My sculpture is a flower and then it kind of has like this bowl thing to it. Really, I needed something to hold my jewelry. And 1 thing is I just love flowers. Flowers are like my favorite,” the student said.

Another student described a short film titled Freshwater Life that includes a river otter, a fish and a mudworm. “My movie is called Freshwater Life. So it has these different animals like a river otter, a fish, a mudworm. Most fun part about making, it was probably doing the animals and making the legs and arms move and, making, like, the different animals eat each other. That was actually really fun,” the student said.

The educator emphasized that art offers students alternative ways to express learning. “When kids are learning, there's traditional ways that they show their learning. And I think having a really strong art program in a school is important because it gives kids another way to express the things that they know in a way that shows their creativity and allows them to use their imagination in ways that they don't always get to do in their regular ed classroom,” the art educator said.

No formal actions or funding details were discussed or specified in the provided remarks.