Syracuse University Art Museum’s PreK-12 Education Program is a key part of our mission. The program aims to develop meaningful partnerships and relationships between Syracuse University faculty, students, and staff and the PreK-12 Central New York community through engagement with the Museum’s collection.
PreK- 12 Educators
The Museum offers a variety of exciting ways to bring our collection and special exhibitions to life and to connect students and teachers with art from around the world. The Museum educational team will work with you to provide either guided or self-guided tours of our collection and/or our temporary exhibitions, as well as provide occasional teachers resources or guides to special displays.
We are excited to offer free school tours! Reservations must be made in advance through the Class and Group Visit request form.
Fall 2024:We are excited to offer a Family Guide that was created by our team of educators to explore the currrent exhibition “Homeward to the Prairie I Come”: Gordon Parks Photographs from the Beach Museum of Art”
PAL Project
The Photography and Literacy Project (PAL Project) was founded by photographer and public educator Stephen Mahan in 2010 and has been under the Museum’s purview since 2021. In its decade-long lifespan, the program has connected Syracuse University students, faculty, and staff with hundreds of local Pre K-12 students to develop creative projects blending photography, digital media, and writing. Mahan passed in 2018, but his panoramic empathy and commitment to social justice and education live on in this program of community-engaged teaching, learning, and creative expression.
This innovative program brings the Museum educational team along with Syracuse University faculty and students into Syracuse City Schools and community centers to develop projects involving photography, video, audio recording and writing. The objective is to improve student’s writing and reading skills by linking these studies with photography, video and poetry. Using “Visual Thinking Strategies,” PAL Project also improves student’s critical thinking and media literacy skills.
PAL Project truly defines the meaning of Scholarship in Action, and exemplifies collaboration among university departments including the Department of Writing & Rhetoric, Light Work, the College of Visual and Performing Arts, the School of Education, and community partners such as Northside Learning Center, Mercy Works at the Clarence Jordan Vision Center, and the City of Syracuse Public Arts Commission.
PAL Project is generously supported by Joy of Giving Something, Inc.