Art Shaping My Future by Simone

Art Shaping My Future by Simone - August 2016 Scholarship Essay

For me Art is a way of life. The moment I picked up my first pencil my mom knew that it would be with me forever. As I entered high school I knew that I wanted to enter the art realm at full throttle. Naturally I was gifted artist and I always tried to handle the extremely rigorous and open- ended nature of the honors art classes I took, with a perfect balance of confidence and curiosity. For every studio problem presented, I would make sure to arrive at it with multiple solutions and stay committed to the idea that the act of struggling to achieve is as important as achievement itself. I let this commitment follow me through my high school career and it continued to help me grow.
My art peers became family, support, encouragement, and a push not only to be a better artist, but a better person as well. They taught me to work through problems as they arose and that every project must be finished strongly. While they were teaching me I was also teaching them and I was growing as a leader at Wilkes Central. I made sure to put an inordinate amount of time into my artwork while also making sure I was still serving my classmates as a peer mentor and a leader. I was inspired to be a reliable person and to have exemplary pieces to present at each critique and I wanted to help keep the art department running in a way that proved that we were a community that would not accept mediocrity, would embrace creativity, and would celebrate the vast differences and contributions that each member of our art community brought to it.
If morale was getting low I never wanted to accept it as something that was not my problem and just sticking to my own thing, because we were a team. Instead I learned from the best that it’s more beneficial to come into the class armed with props and plan to get everyone involved in team building exercises and healthy, fun competitive games.
The class taught me that in any situation you can be equally good at working hard and playing hard, so every moment is worth the work. My care for the art community at Wilkes Central did not stop with the students, I also made sure that teachers and staff were fulfilled as well. Every ounce of spare that I had was spent in my art teachers classroom because she had grown to be a friend and an inspirational figure in my life. If I saw that she was overwhelmed with a group, instantly I would jump in as a second teacher and together we would ensure that every student was given the skills and understanding to succeed. While she was on maternity leave my junior year, she appointed me to be the liaison between herself and the classroom and once again I was growing as a leader and the interactions helped me grow as a person.
Many other teachers and administrators saw how committed and heartfelt I was towards everything thing I did and found me indispensable. Even the cafeteria manager asked me to paint a menu board up on the wall using chalkboard paint. Their contact me was limited to just having her purchase a lunch from them every day and even by that small amount of time they could sense that I would do my absolute best to provide them a quality product! By the end of the school year nearly every day I would go into classroom hauling new project with which someone in the school had entrusted me to complete.
I took nine art classes throughout high school and to me art class became a home. A home that taught me perseverance, how to properly view things and tell my opinions, and one that showed the importance of leading and helping others. Art was just the beginning for me. Eventually I was in over ten clubs and helping wherever I could because it takes a big person to make it a difference in one person's life but an even bigger one to inspire others and be a positive role model that everyone can look up to and depend on.