ArtReach is gearing up for an expanded outreach to schools this year. MPA takes our programs into the schools reaching every member of the student body, and now works with special education students, too. Our resident artist in the schools focuses on special programs and extended learning activities. We feature docent-led gallery tours for elementary school students, including tours and hands-on art activities that demonstrate art principles and incorporate many of the concepts included in the SOLs. We provide free bus transportation to MPA’s galleries to Project Excel schools, schools designated by Fairfax County Public Schools as “at-risk” schools with large numbers of English as second language students or students who qualify for free or reduced lunches.

We also serve schools with a diverse menu of in-school slide lectures and classroom art projects, after-school art workshops and artist visits to art clubs. Recently. our new special education component provided in-gallery tours, art classes and follow-up slide talks and classroom art projects for high school students with special needs who do not receive art instruction or enrichment as part of their classroom instruction. Our ArtReach sessions are the only in-school art educational experience available to them. We are also reaching out to teens through a new program with the Old Firehouse Teen Center in McLean.

All of these programs are offered to schools free of charge. Please contact Roxy Vaughn at 703-790-1953 if you are interested in scheduling an activity for your school.

Thank you to Citi Foundation, Gannett Foundation, Provident Bank, Target and The Wachovia Foundation for supporting ArtReach.