Do you want to make a difference? At SPCC, you can!
Our Service Learning Program is a teaching and learning strategy that combines community service with academic activities and reflective practice. Students grow academically by applying course learning in “the real world.”
At SPCC, students enrolled in service learning courses participate in community service as a portion of the assigned activities. The projects meet the course’s learning outcomes and enhances opportunities for personal and professional growth.
Program Description
Service learning provides students with the opportunity to use the concepts they learn in SPCC courses to practice real-world application. The Service Learning Program facilitates these experiences across disciplines to provide all students at SPCC with the most enriching and valuable learning opportunities. Designated courses offer the service learning as an option while other courses integrate a service project as a portion of the course. Both options allow students to give back to the community while earning course credit.
Another way to participate in community service lies outside of earning course credit. Beginning in the fall of 2020, the School of Arts and Sciences will offer a campus-wide project where students can earn hours for volunteering. The community service hours will be documented for students to submit with resumes or ePortfolios to provide documentation of their participation.
In Ansley Adam’s (pictured) painting class, students began their service learning experience by signing up for the course. The course service component was to raise money for The Butterfly House, a program created by Atrium Health in Albemarle, North Caroline, to serve children who may have been neglected or abused. By creating art and learning how to market it for the organization, the students practiced professional skills needed to be successful as artists with the benefit of helping a community organization.
Michaela wrote this reflection about her learning experiences.
My first ever college art class was taken during the fall semester of 2020. I was fortunate to learn under a professional artist named Ansley Adams, which was only a beginner’s painting class, as the name Painting I (ART 240) suggests. I felt challenged during each and every assignment. We learned how to use art elements like shading, form, line, and hue to construct enticing products.
During this class, we also began a service-learning project. This project, centered on the The Butterfly House Children’s Advocacy Center, has two main goals. One is to generate donations and the other raising support for this non-profit organization. We envision spreading the message of The Butterfly House to our community in order to support their mission that “every child deserves the chance to lead a safe, happy and healthy life.” We will accomplish this vision through social media campaigning, fundraising, and community outreach. Of course, the greatest amount of our efforts will be dedicated towards creating artwork with a butterfly motif. These pieces will be sold on our very own website, in galleries, and to family/friends.
One of the paintings I did in support of the Butterfly House is called, “ .”
After learning the underpainting techniques, I first applied charcoal to a picture printed from online. From there I created what’s called a carbon copy made by pressing a pencil from across the top. Then an underpainting is procured using the following three colors, Burnt Umber, Raw Sienna, and Ivory White. This creates the foundation for a strong painting. From there I applied what’s called the Grisaille method in which the underpainting is transformed into a black and white composition. After this step dries a glaze is coated across the top using paint mixed with a 3:1 ratio of linseed oil, mineral spirits, and liquin.
The painting I chose to copy entertains a dark background accompanied with an orange sitting atop a table. On the top of the orange, a delicate Monarch butterfly sits, almost frozen in time. This was the first-ever painting I had accomplished that took a surmountable time to finish; to be exact, the entire process took almost eight hours.
My goal was to create eye-catching works to sell for the Butterfly House. I have never been much of a painter, but I am truly proud of how this piece came out. I hope that a worthy sponsor will purchase my piece and in turn support this selfless non-profit organization.
Link to the project website: https://aadams049.wixsite.com/butterflyhouse
One of the paintings created as a part of the Butterfly House Project is a painting by James “JR” Johnson’s work entitled Explosive Light. He created the digital painting on an iPad using Procreate in the Service Learning art class, Painting I, (ART-240) in the fall of 2020. Not only did the painting raise awareness and funds for the Butterfly House, it has been nominated for entry in the NCCCS 2021 Student Art Exhibition hosted by Fayetteville Technical Community College Art Gallery.
Explosive Light is an innovative work that applies course learning such as the concepts of abstraction and surrealism, and use of media. It and the rest of the exhibition can be viewed on the 2021 NCCCS Student Art Exhibit website: https://www2.faytechcc.edu/art-gallery/summer-2021.asp