Education
Through
Imagination

By: Be Loud Studios

Transform your classroom into a creative powerhouse with Be Loud Studios' workshop: Learn to write, record, and produce dynamic podcast projects, empowering students through the magic of storytelling.

By: We Scribblin' and Whole Village Art Therapy

The Emotion Compass Project merges poetry, art, and the processing of feelings. You’ll into a journey of self-discovery where poetry and visual art converge to explore and name emotions, fostering emotional intelligence and empowering young minds to express themselves lyrically and visually.

By: Preservation Hall Foundation & Cultural Curriculum Project

Explore the transformative power of music, arts, and cultural understanding to foster community engagement, build relationships, and enhance classroom dynamics, all while tapping into the rich heritage of New Orleans and its culture bearers.

By: New Orleans Center for Creative Arts (NOCCA)

Celebrate students’ unique voices through mixed media portraits! While taking inspiration from culturally diverse artists, and combining ink, collage and a bit of bling, these non-traditional portraits made with accessible materials can be used in the classroom at varied levels of complexity.

By: Goat In The Road

Center student voices, literacy, and creativity through playwriting. Learn about the philosophy and activities of Goat in the Road’s award winning Play/Write program, which brings student plays to life with professional performers.

By: NOLA Artist Incubator

Explore art as a collaborative experience while learning about the various uses of the grid method across different ages and ability levels. After individually drawing and learning about the grid method in drawing, educators will then work collaboratively to create a work of art.

By: Louisiana State University Writing Project

In this hands-on, interactive workshop, educators will learn adaptable writing strategies that push back against formulaic writing instruction and instead encourage authentic writing that centers student voice. Through integrating visual arts into the writing process, transform a singular writing piece into three forms- poetic, narrative and argumentative- while fostering genuine writing and expression.

By: Lyrica Baroque

Help your students identify and understand their emotions through live chamber music.

By: Le Petit Theatre

This workshop offers educators a unique approach to integrating creativity into the classroom. Through theater-based exercises, participants will explore the connection between body, mind, and artistic impulses, gaining valuable tools to enhance creativity and engagement across subjects.

By: Tiana Nobile

Discover actionable strategies in this workshop for helping students navigate challenging texts. Participants will explore erasure poetry, a dynamic approach where students select words from existing texts to construct their own poems. This method fosters a deeper understanding and engagement with the original material, providing educators with a valuable tool for enhancing students' comprehension and expression across subjects.

By: STEM LIBRARY LAB

Join us for a hands-on workshop focused on integrating art into STEM lessons using materials from our Equipment Lending Co-op. During this three-hour session, educators will collaborate on engaging activities, such as creating art with science materials. Explore our collection, including a Skull and Bone Collection for still life drawing, Digital microscopes for macro drawing and abstraction, Papermaking kit with seeds, Paper chromatography for color demonstrations, and more!

Track 1: Arts Literacy

Kurt Wootton (he/him) is the co-founder of the ArtsLiteracy Project. As the ArtsLiteracy’s Project co-director, his work in urban schools with diverse populations led him to work in different countries in Latin America, particularly Brazil and Mexico. He is also the co-director of Habla, ArtsLiteracy’s lab school in Merida, Mexico. With a specialty in creative literacy pedagogies, teacher professional development, and organizational change, Wootton works with teachers and administrators helping to design schools and organizations that are creative, meaningful, and welcoming places.

Track 2: Arts Integration 101

Zeb Hollins III (he/him) has worked as an Arts Educator for over thirty years. He studied Speech/Theatre at Southern University, Educational Theatre with New York University’s Creative Arts Team and worked as a Master Actor/Teacher for six years.

Track 2: Arts Integration 101

Paul Fletcher Malbrough Jr. (he/him) is a native New Orleanian digital illustrator, consent educator, and arts educator. He attended the University of New Orleans, graduating with a Bachelor's Degree in Fine Arts Digital Media in 2011. Paul was chosen as one of the top 20 young artists in New York in the 2011 Curate NYC Juried Exhibition, and also has illustrated textbooks such as “Children with Audiological Needs” by Kate Reynalds, Ph.D. Paul recently finished the KID smART Homegrown Fellowship, AXIS training, and was the summer camp artist for ReNEW Schools Camp at Schaumburg Elementary K-2.

Track 3: Social Emotional Learning and the Arts

Mia Rotondo (she/her) is an activist educator with 20 years of experience in the classroom serving students whose needs are often not met in the general education setting. Mia works closely with fellow radical educators, students, and community members to build and facilitate flexible, child-led learning spaces.

Track 4: L.E.A.D. (Leaders Experiencing Artistic Discoveries)

Samantha King (she/her) has been teaching theatre in New Orleans Public Schools since 2000. Trained in Arts Integration at the University of Tennessee, Chattanooga, she worked for 14 years with elementary and middle school students at Lusher Charter School, and high school students at Edna Karr.

Keynote Speaker

A native of historic Selma, Alabama, Krystal Allen (she/her) is the Founder & CEO of K. Allen Consulting™, an award-winning former teacher and principal, respected organizational leadership and DEI thought leader, and best-selling author of "What Goes Unspoken: How School Leaders Address DEI Beyond Race". Krystal began her career teaching elementary school, then moving into instructional leadership as an administrator, and in 2017, became a social entrepreneur founding what has become a highly sought after global education & management consulting firm serving over 8 countries; major corporate brands, such as Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft; school systems, nonprofits, and government agencies.

Advocacy Day

Jeanette serves as the strategic and vision leader for Kennedy Center’s local and national partnerships with PK-Grade 12 schools and community based organizations, including DC School and Community Initiatives, Changing Education Through the Arts, Turnaround Arts, Ensuring the Arts for Any Given Child and Partners in Education.

The Emotion Compass Project
Dr. Kyley Pulphus-Smith is a mama, educator, and writer from New Orleans. Her nine-year-old describes her best as “a reading and writing doctor” because she looks for ways to help young people become and stay healthy readers and writers. She has written with thousands of children, and her expertise has been sought to support dynamic projects across the country. Recently, her research was recognized and awarded by the International Literacy Association. Outside of work, Kyley enjoys spending time with her hubby and kiddo, and eating delicious, small-batch ice cream.

Social & Emotional Learning in and through Culture

JoDee Scissors is an education media producer, arts-integration specialist, and digital resources creator for Preservation Hall Foundation. She spent 13 years in the classroom before launching into digital learning, ensuring rich education and media content is accessible to teachers, students, and families.

Discovery through Deletion: Sparking Creative Inquiry through Erasure Poetry

Tiana Nobile (she/her) 문영신 is a Korean American adoptee, educator, and author of the full-length poetry collection, Cleave (Hub City Press, 2021) and chapbook, The Spirit of the Staircase (Antenna, 2017), a collaboration with artist Brigid Conroy. Her writing has appeared in Poetry Northwest, The New Republic, Lit Hub, and Southern Cultures, among others. She is a Kundiman fellow, recipient of a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writer’s Award, two-time finalist of the National Poetry Series, and a member of The Starlings Collective.

Tiana earned a BA from Sarah Lawrence College, MAT in Elementary and Special Education from the University of New Orleans, and MFA in Poetry from Warren Wilson College. She lives with her family in New Orleans, Louisiana.

With Feeling & Music

Jaren Atherholt is the newly appointed Principal Oboist of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra and Assistant Professor of Oboe at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. She previously served as Principal Oboist of the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) for eleven seasons. Originally from Fairbanks, Alaska, Jaren left home at the age of sixteen to pursue oboe study at the Interlochen Arts Academy with Daniel Stolper. After graduating from Interlochen, she earned her bachelor's degree in music performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music where she studied with John Mack and a master's degree from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University where she studied with Robert Atherholt.

Playwriting: Centering Student Voice

Shannon Flaherty (she/her) is a performer, arts administrator, and educator originally from New Hampshire. She is co-Artistic Director of Goat in the Road (GRP), and is the project director, as well as a teaching artist, for GRP's young playwrights' program, Play/Write. Shannon has performed in and helped create many GRP productions including The Stranger Disease, Foreign to Myself, Numb, and Major Swelling's Salvation Salve Medicine Show. Shannon has also appeared on stage with Skin Horse Theater, Cripple Creek Theatre Co., and Dillard University. She graduated from Wesleyan University in 2006 and has been living in New Orleans since 2008.

Think Less/Do More

A.J. Allegra (he/him) is the Artistic Director of Le Petit Theatre in New Orleans' historic French Quarter. Originally from Chicago, A.J. is a founding member of The NOLA Project theatre company where, prior to Le Petit, he served as Artistic Director for sixteen years. He has worked as a director and actor for several New Orleans area theatre orgs including The NOLA Project, The New Orleans Shakespeare Festival at Tulane, Southern Rep, Le Chat Noir, JPAS, and Rivertown Theatres and has been nominated for more than twenty Big Easy Awards, winning two. Under his leadership, The NOLA Project was awarded the American Theatre Wing's National Theatre Company award in 2015 and again in 2017 thanks in large part to the uniue partnership forged between The NOLA Project and the New Orleans Museum of Art. Allegra has 16 years of theatre teaching experience at The Willow School and NOCCA. He holds a BFA (Theatre) from NYU and MS (Nonprofit Leadership) from the University of Pennsylvania.

Be Loud in the Classroom!

Alex is a dedicated educator with over 10 years of classroom experience. Throughout this time, Alex has stewarded creative schools and learning environments that encourage hands-on learning, student autonomy, and collaborative problem solving. In New Orleans, he founded and manages Be Loud Studios, a non-profit radio station dedicated to amplifying child confidence through radio and digital media production.

Connecting Writing and Visual Arts through Pairing Strategies: How Educators at all Levels can Integrate Visual Arts into Poetic Forms, Narratives, and Argument Writing

Margaret-Mary Sulentic Dowell, PhD, (she/her) is a Cecil "Pete" Taylor Endowed Professor of Literacy Leadership and Urban Education – School of Education – Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge. She is Director of the LSU Writing Project, and Coordinator of the PhD Program in Educational Leadership. Her research agenda focuses broadly on issues in urban settings including access to writing and the arts (arts integration), literacy leadership, and pedagogical practices that empower students as learners. She is a current NBCT.

Using grids with all ages to create collaborative art

Lissie Stewart (she/her) is the Founder & Executive Director of the NOLA Artist Incubator, a nonprofit focused on arts, education and sustainability. Lissie is a Teach NOLA Master Teacher with ten years classroom teaching experience at the high school level, a Masters Degree in Educational Leadership, and is a certified Louisiana Master Gardener and Permaculture Designer. She serves on the Community Committee for Sprout, and as the Vice President of the NOLA Nature School Board. Currently she facilitates Budding Artists, an early education arts and literacy program she created for 2-5 year olds and their caregivers. Additionally, Lissie advocates for arts, education, and the environment through offering programming at the Galvez Garden, a USDA People’s Garden located in St. Roch.

Materials from the Equipment Lending Co-op for Arts Integration

Brenna (she/her) was born and raised in New Orleans, but if you really press the issue, she’ll tell you her early years were spent in St. Bernard Parish. She graduated in 2013 from the New Orleans Center for Creative Art and was New Orleans Charter Science and Math High School’s 2013 Valedictorian. Unsure of what she wanted to study in college, she studied everything and graduated in 2018 from Dartmouth College with a Bachelor of Fine Arts, two minors in Religion and Biology, and fluency in four languages. Libraries have been Brenna’s passion since she was a child. Not only does she believe in the human right to free and accessible information, but the order and tranquility of libraries have always provided her a personal safe space. She is thrilled to work at STEM Library Lab where she creates a welcoming and exciting place of discovery for tireless educators in the Greater New Orleans area.

Eleanor Humphrey is an actor, creative arts educator, and all-around lover of crafts. She recently made her New Orleans stage debut in No Dream Deferred NOLA’s The Defiance of Dandelions. As an educator, she has taught music theory, theater, vocal technique, choral direction, visual arts, and culinary arts to students of all ages since 2015. In addition to her work with GRP, Eleanor is also a teaching artist for Community Works of Louisiana and a standardized patient for medical schools across the country. She loves to bring her creativity, joyful sense of play, and performance experience into every teaching space. In her free time, you can usually find her reading, crocheting, cooking, or making candles. Eleanor earned her bachelor’s degree from Saint Louis University in 2014 and now lives in New Orleans.

Be Loud In The Classroom!

Jeff Carver (he/him) is the Teacher Fellowship Coordinator for Be Loud, and the Director of Learning at New Harmony High School. He has been teaching and working in education in New Orleans for the last nine years. Prior to teaching, he spent the good part of a decade working in music and advertising.

Szabolcs (he/him) was born in Budapest, Hungary and immigrated to the United States in 1989. He attended Sophie B. Wright Middle School and graduated from McMain High School in New Orleans. Having attended schools in three countries and two states – the lack of funding, equipment and opportunities made an indelible impact on his life’s work. Szabi received his undergraduate degree in Fine Art from LSU and a Masters in History from Southeastern Louisiana University while working as a graduate assistant. He was a mentor teacher who taught 3rd-8th grade Science, Math, ELA and Social Studies for nine years in Orleans, Jefferson, and Tangipahoa parishes. Szabi was also a Louisiana Teacher Leader presenting at the Teacher Leader conference, a LEAP Test review committee member, and a STEM summer camp coordinator. Now, Szabi is the Lending Co-op Program Manager at STEM Library Lab.

The Embellished Self!
Ann Schwab (she/her) is on the Visual Arts faculty at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts- of which she is an Alum. Ann is a current member and past Mentor in the Art21 Educator Network- a cohort of educators passionate about teaching through Contemporary Art. Ann Schwab has been honored in Who’s Who Among American Teachers, has received Scholastic Art and Writing Awards for Teaching, and recognition by the National Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching in the Arts. Ann received her BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art, an MFA and Teaching Certification from Tulane University, and has studied at SACI in Florence, Italy. Schwab has been awarded fellowships by the Maryland State Arts Council, the Louisiana Division of the Arts, and the Surdna Foundation, and professional development grants from the Louisiana Cultural Economy Foundation, the Creative Capital Foundation, the Louisiana Division of the Arts, Anderson Ranch, and the Surdna Foundation. Ann Schwab’s artworks are held in corporate, private, and the State of Louisiana and the City of New Orleans collections. Exploring human relationships with both the natural world and the technological world that we have constructed, Ann Schwab’s artwork utilizes photography, mixed media, installation, audio, and video to illuminate the conflation of these two worlds. Her professional website is: http://www.annschwab.com

Holly Wherry, LPC-S, ATR-BC is a board-certified art therapist, licensed professional counselor and supervisor, artist, and community activist. She is the founder and executive director of Whole Village Art Therapy, and she serves as the Clinical Director and supervisor while also providing direct services to clients of the organization. She has lectured, taught, and worked nationally and internationally, most recently by providing support to mental health professionals in India and Sri Lanka.