Michigan’s economy has negatively impacted the budget for public school art programs, in some cases causing art classes to be completely cut, but this program provides an alternative option that blends a variety of art materials and techniques, said Susannah Van Horn, the program director and visiting instructor for art education at MSU.

“I think the state of the economy is sad, and because art classes are typically the first thing cut, classroom teachers are asked to teach art and they interfere with enhancing the child’s artistic ability due to not having grounded background in the art field,” Van Horn said. “These art education students are helping local children expand their ever-growing interest in the arts.”

Instructor and art education senior Mandy Presley said the first day of class went well.

“(It) was really exciting, we were so pumped, and none of us got sleep last night, it sounded like,” Presley said Saturday. “The kids were really good.”

MSU art education seniors pair up and lead the art classes that are divided into four groups, each classified by different ages, Van Horn said. She said she requires all of her art education students to volunteer in the community, as well as to take part in this program to help them mold into exceptional art teachers for the future.

Van Horn, who creates the curriculum, said she encourages the MSU students to re-invent the classroom setting into an enriching experience so each child leaves inspired and educated about a new art technique while incorporating a cultural understanding of each class theme.

Classes are held during both fall and spring semesters, allowing the MSU students to have an opportunity to teach different age groups.

“There are definitely a lot of children that are repeat students who come back after having a good experience, and this year’s theme was art and nature, and looking at nature as inspiration for art,” Van Horn said.

The classrooms were filled Saturday with chatty students and messy hands that got to create projects of their own rainforests with real leaves, paintings of tropical birds and fish and even clay insects that later would be fired in the kiln and have antennae and wings attached.

“This term we’re actually doing environmental awareness, so we worked on the rainforest today and we did rainsticks and they were super long and they had a lot of fun, and their hands got messy so it was awesome,” Presley said.

The program has been in existence for 37 years, and is based on the traditional 1950s and 1960s concept of museums evolving into a public educational resource, offering classes and having open hours for the whole community, not just the elite and upper-class, Van Horn said.

“My daughter rushed home from school one day, excited about a flyer regarding the program opportunity, and since creating art isn’t really my forte, and there is no art class at her school, I couldn’t wait to enroll her in the program,” said Kara Powers, mother of an enrolled student in the 7-8-year-old age group.