MA, Kent State University, 2017, College of the Arts / School of Art

Teacher quality is a decisive factor in a student's educational experience. In turn, a teacher's continued professional development is crucial to his/her capacity for high quality instructional practice. Recent research indicates that school districts' heightened focus on standardized tests as a measure of student and teacher achievement has resulted in art teachers having fewer subject-relevant opportunities for high quality professional development within their schools and districts when compared with peers teaching “tested” subjects. Counter movements seeking to challenge the rise of “testing culture” in K-12 schools centralize the processes of student creativity, critical thinking, and other 21st century skills—along with the disciplines, subjects, and professional development experiences that are intrinsically predisposed to model and support them. A compelling example of such efforts is found in the work of the Columbus Museum of Art's education department staff, who successfully effected change first within the museum's institutional vision and framework, and next in issues of art education and schooling within their community. This case study of the museum's 2015 Teaching for Creativity Institute indicates that museums are uniquely situated to provide high quality professional development opportunities and create communities of support for art teachers and their non-art teaching colleagues. These professional development experiences also have the potential to serve as powerful advocacy tools for arts education and art museums.

Committee: Linda Hoeptner Poling Ph.D. (Advisor); Koon-Hwee Kan Ph.D. (Committee Member); Juliann B. Dorff (Committee Member) Subjects: Art Education; Education; Education Philosophy; Educational Leadership; Elementary Education; Museum Studies; Museums; Secondary Education; Teacher Education

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2020, Art Education

Research suggests that museums are not reaching their full potential for including visitors with disabilities (Bienvenu, 2019; Ginley, Goodwin, &, Smith, 2012; Kudlick & Luby, 2019; Rappolt- Schlichtmann & Daley, 2013; Sandell, 2019). Recently, scholars have critiqued art museums for their lack of accessibility (Kudlick & Luby, 2019) and exhibitions that misrepresent disability history (Sandell, 2019). The history of outsider art demonstrates how artists with disabilities are discriminated against in the art world (Prinz, 2017). Creative art centers, programs which provide artistic mentorship for adults with disabilities, are often positioned within outsider art discourse (Wojcik, 2016). Due to discrimination against artists with disabilities, art museums can increase inclusion through engaging with artists at creative art centers. Therefore, I utilized action research methodology to design and implement an integrated art museum professional development workshop for artists with disabilities at Open Door Art Studio, a creative art center, and community artists. The primary objective of the study was to explore how museum practitioners can collaborate with creative art centers to develop inclusive programming for creative art center artists and community artists. Based on interviews with Open Door Art Studio artists and staff members, I structured the workshop around time in the museum gallery for discussion and a collaborative art making exercise in the museum's studio space. For the time in the studio, I paired artists from Open Door Art Studio with community artists to create collaborative art pieces. From the post-workshop interviews, I found that the workshop, especially the collaborative portion, supported social connection between artists from Open Door Art Studio and the community artists. This social connection was demonstrated in the way that artists found things in common with each other, spoke about how they enjoyed meeting each other, (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Dana Kletchka PhD (Committee Chair); Jennifer Richardson PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Art Education