Trojan Art Day went on the road to serve students

Contributed photo

High school students participate in Art Day.

Every spring, Troy’s Department of Art and Design holds a half-day art event, in conjunction with the state’s Visual Arts Achievement Program, known as Trojan Art Day.

This event invites middle and high school students from District Two to workshops on campus led by the Department of Art and Design. However, due to the construction of Malone Hall and other Alabama State Council on the Arts facilities, Trojan Art Day 2025 could not proceed as normal.

The Department of Art and Design’s Chair and Professor of Art, Greg Skaggs, suggested taking workshops to the schools until faculty and students can return to Malone Hall. Dr. Kelly Berwager, the Trojan Art Day coordinator and an art and design instructor, reached out to art teachers from the district.

“We get to see the teachers and students when they visit our campus, but we never get to see the schools where they live and work,” Berwager said. “It was good for some of our faculty and art students to remember where our future art students come from.”

The first four schools to respond were Smiths Station High School in Lee County, Charles Henderson Middle School in Troy, Montgomery Academy in Montgomery, Alabama, and Auburn High School in Auburn, Alabama. Three workshops have already taken place this spring, and the last will be in early fall of 2025.

A 3-D workshop with inflatables took place at Smiths Station High School. Cyanotype workshops were held at Charles Henderson Middle School and Montgomery Academy Upper School.

“We don’t have the opportunity to do many 3D projects, so having you all come to us and do the inflatables project was huge,” said Angela Lyles, an art teacher from Smiths Station High School. “My students have never done anything like this before, and they loved it.”

“This project was unique to my students,” said Sara Moore, an art teacher from Charles Henderson Middle School. “They’ve never done anything like this before, so it was exciting to them to do something different.”

Under normal circumstances, around 400 students from 24 surrounding counties come to Troy’s campus for these types of art workshops, food, tours of the Troy campus and an awards ceremony for the Visual Arts Achievement Program participants and winners.

“Visiting the schools this semester wound up being a really wonderful opportunity for our faculty because we’re able to see where our potential students are learning,” said Assistant Professor of Photography Will Jacks. “We were able to provide these workshop opportunities despite the fact that we didn’t have a permanent facility to work in and could maintain a marketing and recruiting connection to the next crop of Troy students was a big bonus across.”

The Department of Art and Design is hoping to return to Malone Hall for Trojan Art Day on March 6, 2026.

For more information about what the Department of Art and Design is doing, follow their Instagram @troy_art_and_design.