Final Artist Statement

This service learning assignment has been challenging and very rewarding. When found out I had to volunteer for this class I was not looking forward to it. I ended up really enjoying meeting new people and being able to give something back to the community. I was surprised how friendly and outgoing everyone at Vieau School was.
The process of trying to take images to use in my projects has been challenging for two main reasons. First, it was challenging because it took a long time to get the permission forms for the people to sign to give me permission to take their picture. It was not until the week before spring break that I finally got permission to take pictures of the students in the ESL class. The Second reason is due to the fact that when I am volunteering in the ESL class at Vieau School I am there to teach the students English. This makes it difficult to take time out of teaching in order to take pictures to use for this class.
Another problem that came up while I was teaching in the ESL class was the language barrier. I do not know much Spanish, and many of the people in the class do not know English very well. Luckily there were two teachers who could help me if I could not understand what people were trying to say. There were a lot of times where things in the materials were not correct that I could not catch because I do not know very much Spanish.
For my final project I chose to arrange my photographs the way I did in order to tell a story. I first put in pictures from all around the community in order to give the viewer a sense of the community in Walkers Point. Then I put in the photographs of the school and some of the artwork in the school. I then put in some pictures of the hallway leading to the library and the library itself to give the viewer the sense that they are walking into the library. Next, I put in pictures of the students and an example of the materials used in the class. Then I put a couple pictures of the birthday party that we had for one of the students in the class. The last thing that I put in the presentation was an interview that I did with the teacher and founder of the ESL class at Vieau School.
I am really glad that service learning was a part of this class. It was a great opportunity to get to know people of a different culture. It was also a great opportunity for me to learn what it is like to try to make a multimedia project. I am not a film major, so this is the first time that I had to take, edit, and make my own images into a presentation.