Art Education

The Art Education program is designed to prepare you for a successful career as a Visual Arts teacher. Rowan’s curriculum includes a wide range of art education, art studio, and art history courses to prepare you as a Teacher of Art in public and private institutions. Field experiences begin early in the sophomore year following each semester thereafter to give you the practical experience needed to teach in K-12 art classrooms. This program culminates with a full year of student teaching at both the elementary and secondary grade levels under the guidance of university Art Education faculty and experienced visual art teachers from the College of Education’s partnering school districts.

Studio course offerings will introduce you to 2-D and 3-D artistic processes in drawing, painting, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, jewelry and graphic arts. From here you can create your own path of studio study through the selection of 300-level advanced studio courses. Art history courses will introduce you to artists and their art from the past to present. The combined skills and knowledge of studio, art history and professional art education courses will foster an understanding of the essential role art teachers play in the education of our youth and engage you in exploring critical areas of inquiry necessary to create a solid foundation in curriculum and pedagogy in Art Education.

The required art education courses include: Introduction to Instruction and Assessment in the Art Classroom, Elementary Art Methods, Secondary Art Methods, Community Art Education at the Elementary through Middle Grades, Community Art Education at the Secondary Grades, Clinical Experience I, Clinical Practice I & II and, Seminar in Clinical Practice II, a capstone course prior to graduation.

Program Guide

What makes the Art Education at Rowan Unique?

Unique to the Art Education program at Rowan is the Saturday Morning Art (smART) program https://academics.rowan.edu/ccca/departments/art/outreach/index.html offering quality visual arts classes to families in southern New Jersey since 1970. Children in grades K-8 join classes on campus to take part in mixed media explorations involving drawing, painting, ceramics, 3-D construction, and printmaking. Taught by clinical interns under the supervision of faculty from Art and STEAM Education, SmART children are given nearly two hours of instructional time allowing for more in-depth artistic practice.

Thematic connections are made with current exhibitions in the Rowan University Art Gallery which also provides smART children and parents access to viewing a range of contemporary art unlike any other exhibition venue in southern New Jersey.

SmART’s high school community sessions inspire creativity in teens directly through their school’s art program. This collaboration between local high schools and the university serve as a unique community partnership where large artistic projects are undertaken. Past projects involved teens in Empty Bowls fundraisers, The Sketchbook Project through New York’s Brooklyn Library, One Million Bones among other art installations exhibited on campus and in Rowan University’s Art Gallery on High St.

The smART program augments the greater mission of Rowan University, preparing students for their chosen careers and their lives by fostering knowledge through study, responsibility through service, and character through challenge.