I am pleased to announce that Sasha Sicurella will become the Coordinator of BCD’s Visual Arts Program for the 2014-2015 school year. Sasha is an arts education specialist, artist, and consultant. With fourteen years of experience, she has taught art to grades Pre K-12 in both public and private American school systems (including Berkshire Country Day School from 2004-2007). She is currently the Director of Education at Omi International Arts Center in Ghent, NY where she has spent ten years developing and implementing public, arts-based programming for people of all ages.
Sasha is also the founding director of the I AM: International Foundation, a non-profit organization that works globally to provide opportunities for children to explore identity through art and self-portrait photography. Since 2010, the I AM: Projects have served more than 1,000 children and youth in fourteen countries including Rwanda, Mongolia, Cambodia, Thailand, India, Italy, Romania, Israel, Mexico, and Ethiopia. Projects target marginalized populations such as children with disabilities, victims of human trafficking and abuse, orphans, juvenile offenders, and impoverished communities.
As an arts-education consultant, Sicurella works with schools, arts organizations, and international NGOs to establish integrated creative learning models, specializing in groups with limited resources. Clients include the Rwanda Education Assistance Project (REAP), Goutte d’Eau (Cambodia), and the Royal Textile Academy (Bhutan), and the Sports & Arts in Schools Foundation (SASF) in New York City.
Sasha received a BFA degree from the University of British Columbia and an MFA from NYU. She is a certified teacher of K-12 Art in both Massachusetts and New York. Her work has been exhibited in the United States and internationally at museums and art centers in Tel Aviv, Milan, Mumbai, Addis Ababa, Bratislava, Ulan Bator, and New York. Her project, I AM: Mongolia is the subject of the documentary film, Water, Ice, Snow (2013, dir. Karim Raoul).
In addition to teaching Mixed Media art classes at BCD next year, Sasha’s primary areas of responsibility, beginning this summer and through next year, will also include:
Consulting and Development:
o Creating and articulating a Discipline-based Art Education Program in a Studio Framework Concept and Design
o Developing the physical design of three arts studios: Painting and Drawing, Ceramics, and Mixed Media & Sculpture
o Developing, defining, and articulating the Arts Curriculum
o Conducting general research and program development
Program Implementation:
o Coordinating the set-up of the three studios
o Hiring two other part-time teachers for “Painting and Drawing” and “Ceramics”
o Coordinating program details and meetings, and supervising and maintaining the programs
o Organizing and attending related events such as art exhibitions
o Participating in Parents’ Nights and parent-teacher conferences, writing reports, etc.
Sasha has developed and presented a three-year plan for leading the visual arts program at BCD. Students in grades K-6 will take trimester-long art classes in each of the three studios during the course of the year, and the number of classes offered our students will remain the same as in previous years. Students in grades 7-9 will continue to take two “Arts Block” classes a week, each meeting twice weekly, and they will select from a range of offerings in the Visual Arts, Theater, Music, Digital Music Composition, Woodworking, Ceramics, and Graphic Design. It is exciting to imagine what the promise of Sasha’s leadership, creativity, connections, and teaching will bring. I am equally enthusiastic about the relationship that BCD may forge with Art Omi, the I AM: International Foundation, and other arts organizations, artists, etc. Sasha has officially started, and we will be announcing more, including the names of the other studio arts teachers and the Arts Block classes, later in the summer..
