Arts Encounter
M&G’s Arts Encounter program represents our best efforts to combat South Carolina’s academic challenges. Our certified education staff utilizes the power of arts-integrated curriculum to increase student interest and improve student academic performance. Arts-integration is the well-researched, rapidly-growing methodology of education that promotes student learning in both the arts and across all core subjects, including STEM topics, social studies, and literature. By using the arts in every lesson plan for all classroom subjects, M&G’s educational team is able to visualize for students the difficult concepts they need to succeed in school and in life.
The four distinct elements of the Arts Encounter program are:
M&G’s museum educator partners with South Carolina public and private schools to bring in-school , arts-integrated lessons, that meet state standards, to thousands of K–12 students every academic year. Last academic year (2023-2024), MOM reached nearly 1,143 K–12 students–95% were in public schools with only a 20-hour, part-time educator for 3 months. This academic year, our 30-hour educator will pass this number by Thanksgiving. M&G offers both in-person lessons and digital lessons for classrooms.
While M&G is closed, it’s more difficult for us to provide as many cultural interactions that lead to discoveries; however, we’re still offering tours to some special collections on the campus of Bob Jones University. View the Specialized Tours to see if your students might enjoy coming!
M&G partners with families and co-ops to bring arts-integrated education to K-8 homeschool audiences. Just like all of M&G’s educational programming, the focus includes learning about art techniques and styles while broadening understanding about history, culture, science, literature, math, and more. The topics and projects change each year, and we’ve already filled all the fall 2024 lesson sessions! Home educators can use a digital lessons series focused on seven ancient civilizations, The Age of Antiquity. OR M&G offers an in-person lesson series for the 2024-2025 academic year, Artists in Focus.
Carefully designed by M&G educators to combat summer learning loss among the Upstate’s K–8 students, Kids Create! features a compelling mixture of learning sessions and hands-on art projects, all designed to integrate art into every day experiences. Special guest lecturers are featured, allowing students to make the connection between the abstract nature of art creation and everyday life and work. Attendance continues to grow each year!
The response to the Arts Encounter outreach has been tremendous, with parents, educators, and administrators alike praising the effective, innovative methods the programs collectively employs.
Here are what a few of Arts Encounter’s satisfied patrons are saying:
- “The program you have developed is truly amazing, and clearly the Museum and Gallery is an underutilized resource for our schools.”– the Assistant Superintendent for Principal Supervision and School Accountability for the Greenville County Schools
- “Excellent speaker! Your instructor used examples the students could identify with. I loved her hand motions. The children had a firm grasp of the use of propaganda by the time she left. And, I must admit, she cleared up a few misunderstandings I had. I will use what she taught us in future lectures.” – 7th-grade teacher
- “Your educator is engaging as well as creative. My children enjoy the classes and find them very interesting. I have to say I find them interesting and learn new things too. The teacher is very good at keeping the interest of variable ages, and using different teaching techniques to reach all the children.”–Local home school mom, after her children attended a Homeschool Days.
- “I loved learning how to read pictures. I never knew they were actually telling me something. Now I can look at a picture and understand what’s going on in it.”–Riverside High School English student, on learning how to read symbolism in a painting.
- “Thank you for a wonderful and helpful presentation. My students often struggle to make real life connections, and I feel more able to connect math to art in meaningful ways… Thank you for such a compelling educational odyssey and for the chance to explore a fabulous art gallery that had been unknown to me.”—Middle School Math Teacher
- “I have scheduled another Ancient Rome lesson for second semester. I will schedule the first lesson on Ancient Greece again next year. This is an excellent program that greatly enhanced our Ancient Greek studies. I appreciate the professionalism and organization of the instructor.”—3rd grade teacher
- “It was a wonderful experience! My students were so excited about this project and thoroughly enjoyed it! M&G representatives were very professional and available to answer any questions throughout the planning of the lesson.”—5th grade teacher
- School’s $60 price per lesson: M&G’s $60 average classroom fee is primarily a registration fee to hold the appointment and help with gas/travel expenses, and is well below the actual value of the arts-integrated programming the museum delivers.
- M&G’s $400 cost per lesson: The real cost of M&G’s arts-integrated program delivery, 85% of which is carried by M&G’s budget, (made by gifts from you, foundations, and sponsorships). As a result of these efforts by M&G to carry the majority of AE’s cost, in the past academic years, nearly 99% of educators reported M&G’s AE outreach was either the “right price” or “underpriced.”
- Would you support us? Every year, M&G’s Arts Encounter outreach touches the lives, minds, and hearts of thousands of underserved Upstate youth, educators, and families.
