Dallas ISD recognized for arts education

Science. Technology. Engineering. Mathematics. The acronym STEM has taken over the school system, but even with a major focus on the “hard” subjects, Dallas Independent School District’s “soft” subjects are flourishing.

For the fourth year, Texas Art Education Association awarded our schools a District of Distinction Award for arts education. Two of our Oak Cliff school educators are exemplifying that distinction through their classroom dedication.

Yolanda Burton, the art teacher at David W. Carter High School, says that she often sees the community and schools think of art as a smaller program, something of a placeholder for students that need a class.

“Some campuses will diminish the programs because of that, as I’ve even heard administrators have, not at my campus but other campuses before, call it ‘cut, paste and color’ and so they devalue the arts,” she says. “Not understanding that the arts have such a tremendous impact on the growth of students.”

Burton emphasizes that having classes like art open up the brain to a new way of learning that transfers into other subjects and can help students in their future careers, even if they are not growing up to be artists.

“Design thinking is one of the biggest things that they use in industry today, whether it’s an engineer, whether it’s a nurse, whether it’s doctors,” she says. “Let’s say they go into medical science and they need to be able to look at models and look at the human body. They have an understanding of it because those portals opened up in the brain early.”

Burton has worked as an educator for decades, originally earning a degree in elementary education after graduating from Dallas ISD.

Outside of the classroom, she is an artist with a focus on nature and humanity, creating in both 2D and 3D media. She earned a certificate to teach art in 2002 and even before she was the official art teacher, hosted an art club for students in her previous schools.

Now she has been at Carter High School as an art teacher for a decade, where the program has changed drastically over time.

“Before I came to Carter High School, we weren’t seeing them … the participation at that campus wasn’t as high as some of the other campuses in terms of competitions and opportunities for students,” she says.

Under her leadership, the students have gone from just two art courses to four levels along with jewelry and ceramics programs.

Today, Burton says they have 100% support for both student and teacher participation in organizations, making supplies and competitions accessible to students and community events that get everyone in Oak Cliff involved in art education.

“All of that has led to us becoming that district of distinction. It has happened all over in campuses throughout the district and we can really work together to show up in the competitions and show up in the community,” she says.

That spirit of collaboration with the community reigns true throughout the neighborhood schools. Just over 10 miles away, Rosemont Primary School’s art classroom is holding one of the upcoming community projects. A rainbow mobile the height of Dirk Nowitzki hangs from the ceiling made up of recycled materials prepared for the Oak Cliff Art Walk in October.

Alice Segura, an art teacher originally from Naperville, Illinois, outside of Chicago, sits beside it with charcoal-stained finger tips. She says art education has been her safe space since her youth.

“I do have a learning disability, and so I struggled a lot in my other classes,” she says. “And art was the one place that I was on level with everybody else and didn’t need help.”

Segura says that when she got to high school there was a big push to study foreign languages, something that became difficult for her.

“The way my brain works, it’s very difficult for me to learn that second language,” she says. “And so finally, my parents were like, ‘You don’t have to stay in the class. You can do something else.’ So I went to art, and in high school, I was kind of like, ‘Oh, wait, this is where I can succeed, and this can be my second language for myself.’”

During her student teaching, she had the opportunity to literally use art as language, demonstrating a lesson for the first day of class without a single word of instruction, a tradition the teacher whose classroom she joined does every year for middle school students. Students simply watched her movements shown out from the projector to communicate as she put together an origami crane.

Growing up outside of Chicago, one of her earliest art class memories is the library system allowing people to check out master artworks in frames. To involve parents, the school had a program that encouraged parents to come into the classroom once a month and teach kids about the borrowed artwork.

Her dad did it for Vincent Van Gogh’s Starry Night, playing the song “Vincent” by Don McLean, and her mom sent in cookies as her class did a project. Moments like this inspired Segura to grow up and teach art.

“I just love seeing the kids be successful,” she says. “I love seeing them problem solve, be creative… art education and doing art made me feel like I could do something, and I wanted other kids to feel that way. That they can take that ability and become something, do something, have a job.”

Like the support she received growing up for her art education, Segura says she has received support for the arts here in Oak Cliff.

“I’m so proud that we are getting this distinction, because our district does do so much for the arts,” she says. 

From support to enter TAEA’s Junior Visual Arts Scholastic Event to collaborations with the Dallas Museum of Art or the Nasher Sculpture Center, there are so many school districts that don’t get to experience an art museum, she says.

“Art in school is so important for our kids … those people that can be creative, have creative problem solving skills are the ones that are going to be more successful and have better opportunities for them,” Segura says.