SPEARMAN, TEXAS -- Spearman High School's art class is making its mark. Some of their masterpieces are being bought to pay for class trips.
Spearman's Art Teacher is not only engaging the minds of her young students, she's also inviting parents and the community to get involved. It's this week's Region 16 Spotlight on Education report.
"I teach them a pretty hard curriculum I actually use a lot of the lesson plans I had in college. So I'm teaching pretty advanced," said Elizabeth White, Spearman High School Art Teacher.
"I've always liked drawing since I was little. I haven't always been the best, but being in art Ms. White teaches you to better your strengths, but she also helps you on your weaknesses," said Paige Pierson, Spearman High School Senior.
It's that teaching style that has helped her students succeed in state contests.
"The State of Texas has a wonderful art competition called, "The Visual Arts Scholastic" event. It's once a year and students can enter up to two pieces. We always participate in that and last year our students were responsible for half the state entries in the whole Panhandle," said White.
Most of the students are gold medalists, and White makes sure the community is aware of that.
"Quarterly I send out four to five pages newsletters and I send them out digitally as well as snail mail to all the parents so they know what we're working on and how hard the kids are working ad the quaility of their work," said White.
The newsletter also helps the students host art shows around town, giving them the opportunity to sell their works to raise funds for school trips. This year, they went to Taos, New Mexico.
"Taos is a very beautiful place there was, we took a lot of pictures in the square of Taos and we just went to churches we went out to the gorch there and we took pictures out there of the landscape, it was nice," said Seth Carson, Spearman High School Junior.
Some of the students say they'll use their art skills in the future. Some plane to pursue careers in graphic design.
