Pre-College Summer programming sees growth amid diverse arts K-12 camps

Each summer, the College of Fine Arts offers summer arts programming for pre-K through graduating high school seniors to provide unique opportunities for students to dive into various genres of art with their peers. This summer has seen further growth in the subjects offered, particularly for students just on the cusp of beginning their collegiate journey and exploring emerging concepts. 

For instance, the School of Dance offers a Summer Dance Institute to learn new techniques with a visiting guest dance company; this summer featured the Full Circle Dance Company. The School of Music’s Summer Music Academy also just completed its 15th year of providing a wide range of different instrument and ensemble-based sections for students to fine tune their technical abilities under the tutelage of OHIO instructors.   

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Summer Arts for Youth camps focus on the middle school and younger students, beginning in June with Tantrum Theater summer camps, continuing with visual arts camps, and wrapping up the summer in early July with music week with the Athens Community Music School.  

OHIO’s Pre-College Summer Programs are directed at high school students interested in taking their skills to another level in a classroom of their peers and attracts students from a variety of backgrounds and geographic locations. 

This year, Interior Architecture was introduced as a new offering. Lynnette Bush Clouse, assistant professor of Interior Architecture in the School of Art + Design said she approaches space planning with her students “from a human centered design… how humans interact with space and why things are [chosen to be] in that space.” 

This creates an easy entry point for high school-aged students, most of whom have not yet had a chance to meet a professional architect, to see what the design process of an OHIO space looks like with the real planning documents that were used when those spaces were being built as examples.  

Manushree Arora came to OHIO from New Delhi, India out of an interest that grew from working on interiors in her own home.

“I have designed my room, and a few parts of my house, too,” Arora said. “My mom… she's done stuff around the house, and I've loved it. That’s how I actually got into interiors.”  

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The deeper dive Clouse provides into all the possible trajectories of careers in the interior architecture field opened Arora’s eyes to the larger “concepts of interior architecture, the floor plans, and architectural elements. I really got into it, and I think I want to go for this in my future.” 

Other students have attended multiple years to try out their skills in new forms of art to test unfamiliar waters. Charlie Singleton, from Gahanna, returned this year to study ceramics after having previously taken 2D visual art classes.  

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“This is my first time doing [ceramics], I hadn't done anything with 3D yet. I do a lot of interdisciplinary stuff, and I thought that this would be a really good introduction to it, especially since I don't have the time on my schedule at my school to do it there,” Singleton said. 

“It's been really positive,” Lief Siegel, of Athens, added. “I’ve met a lot of new people and had interactions that I never would have had if I didn't take this program. It kind of inspired me to maybe continue trying to do more ceramics and 3D art for the rest of my life!” 

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The School of Music’s Contemporary Music and Digital Instruments (CMDI) class offering drew students interested in the chance to work with emerging music instruments and arts-based technology in group settings. 

Nick Schott, from Millersburg, has attended CMDI multiple summers because “it was really the only contemporary program with actual modern production techniques. As the program grows, there's definitely more talent coming in. We're kind of channeling the creativity in more effective ways, which is neat.” 

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Sean Parsons, associate professor of CMDI in the School of Music, has taught for multiple years in the Pre-College Program and highlights its growth.

“We’ve had more students in the CMDI/popular music track than ever before and had the opportunity to showcase student’s original works they prepared during camp and, in some cases, the work they did last year,” he said. “Students are given wide creative license within the program to explore their interests and to enjoy their time together. We did everything this year from EDM to Nirvana to beat making to creating songs with the use of AI. They even got a taste of getting beat up on by their professor in Mario Kart as we spent an afternoon in the OU eSports facility.” 

One common theme with the pre-college cohort of students was the repeated advice to future attendees to not be afraid to step outside of your comfort zone, try new things, and to enjoy the company of your fellow students.  

CMDI student Jade Ney, an incoming first year from Oxford, believes that keeping creativity at the forefront of your summer is the trick.

“Spend lots of time on just working on things outside of class, like writing lyrics or writing melodies,” Ney said. “Just try to get out of your normal habits and not scroll screens forever. 'Cause it's good to get out of your habits, and it's easy whenever you're in a different space.”  

Singleton also stresses that the community of students is equally as important for his practice.

“You’ve got to be open to hanging out with people, because you can spend upwards of 15 hours of the day with someone, and so if you come here nervous about meeting people, you don't have to be, because you will find people,” Singleton added. 

Students interested in applying for next year’s summer opportunities are encouraged to look for updates on future summer programming in the coming months.