Charlie Waters has used Tucker Community Foundation grants to build an Art Program for varied interest and skill levels at Tucker County High School.


Charlie Waters: My name is Mary or Charlie Waters and I am the art teacher at Tucker County High School.

Okay, so the grant was to build an art program that serves Tucker County High School art students – our art program. So that’s all the high school students of Tucker County.

Well this year I wrote the grant in order to continue to supplement ceramics program that we’ve been building for the last few years with the help of the Endowment funding. And part of the funding this year was to develop our painting and drawing class through some illustration courses that I am going to take so I can learn how to teach it and some equipment for students to be able to use.

So this is the third year that we have received a grant and it makes all the difference in the world in being able to create a program that students in taking art beyond the fact that they have to take an art class for a credit. Because of the ceramics program I’ve been able to develop a 3D and Ceramics Class that really interests students who don’t consider themselves to be artists because they like building things with their hands and they like working with clay. So prior to being able to get all this equipment we didn’t really have that option at all. And then it’s also allowing me to further develop the painting and drawing class for more serious art students because their kind of more separated out now from the rest of the group who is taking it maybe only for a credit or because they like working in 3D form.

You know there’s like a whole posse of students who are really getting into art because we actually have a succession of classes for them to take. And they are thinking about maybe either going into Art in college or maybe how they can take their art into their adult life. Aleah Hanlon, MaKayla Ware: two really really interested students. Their art is fantastic. I think they could get into any Art program anywhere just because they’ve really developed their creativity and their skills because we’ve had enough to offer them. Yeah, it’s really cool.