Rosy-Grace Duma is your typical 4th grader at Stratton Academy of the Arts. She’s active, engaged, loves her teachers, and is interested in exploring the world of art. “Ms. Rudolph is my favorite teacher,” she says. “She’s really fun and funny, and she helps me with math by making it something I can see with art and hands-on.”
As a Stratton student, Rosy-Grace can pursue her choice of artistic expression. Throughout students’ time at Stratton, they’re exposed to various art mediums and techniques, meet professional artists, and even showcase their own work through performances and exhibits. Because the elementary-school core curriculum is taught through an arts lens—including visual art, music, drama and dance—Rosy-Grace’s math, reading, science, and social studies classes all incorporate some lesson of creative self-expression.
Rosy-Grace is a visual artist and she particularly loves painting and sculpture. She participates in the Everyday Arts Lab After School Program, presented by University of Illinois art education students. A unique partner program open to Stratton students, it extends art experiences through studio explorations that foster their development as artists, creative thinkers, and critical problem solvers. “We made this one project where you make something that looks like something else you use every day,” she explains. “I made a banana phone and a hamburger computer out of a special clay that bakes in the oven so it lasts forever.”
Rosy-Grace and her family chose Stratton because it’s in her neighborhood—they weren’t familiar with the magnet program at the time. It was a happy coincidence, because Rosy-Grace is thriving academically and she’s discovered a real talent and passion through the opportunities and lessons of self-expression. She can see a future for herself in the arts.