All students at UMS will have an experience with traditional art making through the cycle electives program that takes place in the 7th grade. As a part of the cycle electives programs, all 7th grade students will explore visual arts in painting, drawing, and other media for 1 marking period.
Additionally, students in both 7th and 8th grade have the opportunity to choose from a plethora of visual arts elective courses. Each of these electives is 1 semester long. To see a listing of these courses, please view the UMS Program of Studies.
The visual arts electives available to students in both the 7th and 8th grade range from traditional art making forms to modern digital based applications. Additionally, many of our courses take advantage of our new STEAM initiative. STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math and is an innovative movement in education that promotes the importance of the arts as a partner discipline with science, math, technology, and engineering. The world of the visual arts today is steeped in technology and design. Companies are hiring artists and engineers to work together to ensure that design and function work seamlessly together. UMS is excited to reflect this trend in its redesigned course offerings.
Of course, the traditional forms of art making are just as important to the development of our students and their understanding of the visual world around them. Student development of self identity and self awareness through their creative ideas and communications in the visual arts is a constant theme of all the courses we teach.
Our visual arts faculty information is listed below. Welcome to the arts at Montgomery Upper Middle School!!