Arts and crafts hold a place at Hopkins—not in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, but in Art Brigade!, a community service organization on campus.
A part of the Center for Social Concern, the group runs an afterschool program in conjunction with the Living Classrooms Foundation, bringing arts and crafts to elementary school children in East Baltimore.
Living Classrooms Foundation is a Baltimore-Washington non-profit that emphasizes experiential learning. Art Brigade! carries this emphasis into their own work, making the ability to provide independent and personalized attention a central part of their mission. "We teach the kids who can't get picked up after school," Kavita Jain explained. Jain is a junior at Hopkins and the vice president of Art Brigade! "[For example], we try to interact with the children… Our founder used to call what we do ‘coloring with kids," and we have taken coloring and tried to turn it into teaching them and making them excited about what they're doing."
Art Brigade! was founded just three years ago, by now-alumni Andrea Nelson and Sarah Bresler. "They had a vision to create a club that dealt directly with arts education in inner city Baltimore," Dona Trnovska said. Trnovska, a senior at Hopkins and the president of Art Brigade!, went on to explain that Nelson and Bresler had realized that there was no community service organization on campus that dealt only with children and art.
Despite the variety of groups that connect university students with inner-city students, none of them were providing arts and crafts activities. The simple art provides a great creative outlet for the students. "Many of these kids don't have art during the school day, unfortunately, due to budget cuts," Trnovska said. "That's where we come in. We firmly believe that a well-rounded education includes art. . . children [exposed to it] not only develop creativity but also self confidence."
Despite the organization's youth, they have a dedicated team of 50 volunteers who go downtown at least once a week to work with students one-on-one.
Art Brigade! teaches at two sites, Tench Tilghman Elementary School in East Baltimore and the Carmelo Anthony Youth Center. Volunteers are there two days a week at each school to teach over 120 students in total. Although they primarily work with students in grades one through five, they've also taught kids as old as eighth graders in the past.
"The children [are] extremely funny and somehow the craft always ends up on their faces," Trnovska said. The types of crafts range from making paper bag haunted houses during Halloween to decorating inspirational characters for Black History Month.
The group has a "creativity committee," managed by Jackie Heath, a sophomore who also works as the group's treasurer. The committee discusses what the crafts for the month will be. They make mock-ups that are then brought down to the classes as examples, and also work to ensure that there are enough supplies for the students.
The group is entirely funded by the Center for Social Concern "and bakesales," Jain added. The schools they program with don't contribute supplies.
Instead, Art Brigade! provides for and teaches their craft sessions entirely on their own. "The Center for Social Concern has been very generous [though]," Jain said.
The creativity committee also works on finding crafts that will be fun for the wide range of ages Art Brigade! deals with. "Truthfully, lots of the kids aren't always enthusiastic," Jain said, explaining how older students are not always as excited to work on crafts.
Although the teachers vary the difficulty level of the craft depending on the age of the student, the craft doesn't always appeal to everyone.
Keeping this in mind, the organization instead stresses the pride that comes with finishing any craft, simple or difficult. "We like for the children to take pride in what they have done and to feel like they have accomplished something when they leave," Jain said. "There is a huge payoff when the kids bombard you with hugs . . . and make crafts for you. I have a wall at home full of things the kids have made me."
Art Brigade! also takes students out of the school environment and into the city, organizing trips to museums around Baltimore. "Last year, we took the children on a field trip to the BMA. We handed them worksheets [to] draw art that mirrored the types of artwork they were seeing," Heath said. "For example, we showed them a painting that made us use pointillism, and on the sheet they each had to make their own drawing that made use of [that]."
The organization has plans to expand this semester, not only in terms of more field trips but also with more frequent site visits. "If we get more members in the spring. . . we will be able to branch out to go to both of the sites each day," Heath said.
Heath, Jain and Trnovska are hopeful about Art Brigade! expanding, especially after their organization won the CSC group award for Urban Education last year, making them one of the most influential campus groups in Baltimore. The group was anonymously nominated for the award and then chosen out of all the CSC groups as the winner. In other words, it the most successful urban education program that year.
"It's the kind of club people enjoy being in," Heath said. "Members easily form friendships. . . . [and] the common thread through all of our members is their desire to help children express themselves and feel proud of something they've done." Heath emphasized that a background in the arts is definitely not a requirement to get involved. Heath, Jain and Trnovska all have no experience with arts, and simply enjoy the hands-on projects and the time with the kids. "If you're not good, they can get a good laugh looking at how much better their craft looks than yours," Heath said. "It's a win-win!"
Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The News-Letter.