Nancy Petrella

Petrella’s innovative teaching idea, “Odyssey Through Art," focuses on teaching art history and studio art courses to a diverse group of high school students at the Odyssey Charter School. In the art history course, students will explore ideas by using critical thinking and analytical skills to learn about culture through art and architecture. Students involved in the project will learn to connect citizenship with art and their own ideas as they develop an understanding of ways that their generation will impact the future. In the Voya grant-funded studio art course, students will focus on pottery and sculpture as a connection to today’s culture and create a means for expressing modern ideas. These combined courses will connect the past to the present with the students' experiences to art and the future.