Art Education K-12

Shannon Gagne, Supervisor
860-658-0451, ext. 620 | sgagne@simsbury.k12.ct.us

SHS Art Alumni Testimonials

Adele Rossignol (SHS Class of 2019, Wheaton College)

Excerpted from a letter written by Adele Rossignol to Shannon Gagne (January 20, 2020):

As a Psychology and Hispanic Studies double major, I have a significant example of how non-art majors are using their high school art education in college, and wanted to share my work with you in the hopes that it helps Simsbury understand the extent of the impact that its art education has on its students…

…[M]y college has been having an issue with swastika incidents this past semester…On three separate occasions, a swastika has been drawn in a public place on campus. In order to confront this issue from a student perspective, my group decided to create an installation utilizing positive, personally significant symbols with which people from our campus community do identify. We wanted to show how symbolism can relate to identity and can unify a community with respect of the diversity within it, despite the desire of an individual(s) to make another feel excluded.

Our final product was a mannequin, upon which symbols anonymously submitted from the campus community were applied. This was to signify the unified identity of our college (Wheaton College MA). We created a website with a promo video about it in order to convince other schools and institutions to follow our process and do the same, in order that they may have an art installation on their grounds using all of the symbols with which their community identifies...

I would happily attest to the fact that my art education continues to change my life, and it is currently manifesting itself by unifying my campus community in light of series of hate crimes. Though I have always sung the praises of my wonderful high school art teachers, I also wanted to remind you what an impact my connection with you and your team of educators has had on me.

Conveying Identity Through Shared Symbols project website