Meredith Roberts
Q: Tell me about your background. (Where are you from? Where did you go to school?)
A:Well, I’m originally from here. I graduated from here in 1990. I did my undergraduate work at Oklahoma State University. I did my graduate work at Ohio State University, in Columbus, OH. So, I have an undergrad in painting and my graduate work is a masters in art education.
Q: How did you get into education?
A: I started out painting and working in galleries, so selling work. And then for my graduate assistant-ship, I was a curator for in Ohio State at the gallery there.But actually I went and tried to make it as a painter but it wasn’t for me. I’m too much of an extrovert. And then, I actually went to seminary for a while and decided that I really worked with kids in a juvenile facility, they were incarcerated and ended up doing a lot of art therapy with them. And decided I wanted to go back into art education and what was great is Ohio State art ed department is different from most there’s few programs in the country, Penn state has one. Where the art education department is in the art department. It’s not in the education department. So, it was exactly where I wanted to be. Because I believe in full arts immigration, that I could teach any subject through art and so I just love it.
Q: How long have you been in education?
A: I graduated with my masters in 2002 so since then. 16 years in different venues, so I’ve taught K-12 but I’ve also taught in community centers. I taught 3-83, home school, like I said in community centers and several summer art education programs. Last year, I taught at the Oklahoma State University and i did all the art education departments for the community centers but I was employed through the University. I’m a working artist, I paint and show and sell my own work.
Q: What classes do you teach?
A: I teach Art and am a coach for Mock Trial.
Q: What made you think you wanted to do Mock Trial and coach us?
A: They needed me, but I think being able to respond and think critically is part of what I do here. And my brother is a trial attorney, he’s a federal attorney. And judge Landryth is my uncle so that’s another reason why I came back. I did debate when I was your age didn’t have mock trial.
Q:What is your favorite part of your job and why?
A: I like helping students find their visual voice. I talk about visual literacy in here all the time, how you read and write images so I feel like we are our own language. And an image is worth how many words? A thousand. So we’re screaming all the time with any image.
Q: Why did you decide to come to Ada High and how do you feel about it so far?
A: It’s home and I absolutely love all the kids. I have a heart for advanced placement. The college board when they started doing advanced placement, which has been around for 20 years, art and English were the first subjects added because we’re so subjective. When we add assessment, we add validity to our area of expertise. Unlike math and science, there’s only one right answer and with us it’s completely different so the assessment criteria adds validity to what I do.
Q: What is your favorite animal and why?
A: It’s an iguassom, half iguana, half opossum. I made it up but why because he’s so interesting looking. It’s one of a kind. I’ll have to show you my coffee mug. The iguana is the head and the opossum is the butt.