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Community Engagement Spotlight | Katherine Scarpello

Katherine Scarpello's inspiration began three years ago in a service learning course.

  • published: 2018/06/25
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Katherine Scarpello is a senior Studio Arts and Nonprofit Management student at UNO. Scarpello plans to become an artist, arts facilitator, and educator and hopes to inspire her students to create a new understanding of the world.

Her spark of inspiration began three years ago in a service learning course in partnership with Blackburn Alternative Program.

For a class project this semester, Scarpello decided to partner with Blackburn Alternative High School. As a former Blackburn student, she hoped to give students an outlet to be creative and express how they feel about America today through art. Scarpello and the Blackburn students sat down to discuss “What does it mean to be an American today?”

Taking your theories that you’re learning in classes and applying it to the real world is the most important thing. I think service learning should be a part of every class. You’re not just talking the talk, you’re walking the walk.

 Katherine Scarpello

The students were encouraged to draw, doodle, write, paint, and collage in order to visualize their responses. Scarpello put her teaching skills into action and created lesson plans and team building exercises to help facilitate the process. Scarpello said about her project, “I actually want to hear what they have to say. I want to have this time where the Blackburn students can get a break and talk about real-world things and make something cool.” The artwork was displayed during the month of October at the UNO Art Gallery.

Find more stories like Katherines, check out the P-16 Initiative Fall 2017 Newsletter.

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