Graphics at NHS

Newtown High School’s Graphics class has been drawing in a surplus of students lately, and is one of the more unique and expansive humanities courses offered to students, and will teach skills that are useful beyond high school.

In Graphics I, students are taught how to create a variety of things. They start by making designs on Adobe Illustrator, and transfer those designs onto different physical objects. They will end up making projects like T-shirts, mugs, and stickers, among other things. 

The Graphics classes, taught by Steve George, sometimes even produce products for members of the Newtown community. They are one of only a few courses in this school who produce a product for the public.

“So with everything that they do in here, every assignment that they have, or thing they have to learn how to design, they’re actually walking away with something. So they're making something,” George said.

Graphic II expands on what has already been learned, and offers a lot of new material too. Laser cutting is introduced, as well as paper products.

“They learn how to make paper products, like business cards. They learn how to make notepads.
They learn how to make. Right now, they're doing greeting cards. So there's a lot of things that they learn how to do, and teaching them the skills that they learn in Adobe Illustrator helps them get there,” George continued.

Graphics will seem at least intriguing to almost anyone. However, there are some specific groups of people who find themselves far more interested in it than the rest. These may be students who express themselves through art. The class, after all, does involve a great deal of design elements.

“My personal favorite part about graphics is the creative freedom. As long as its not illegal, inappropriate, or offensive, it’s pretty much whatever we wanna make,” NHS freshman Reily Kling said. Kling is an avid artist and a big fan of her graphics class.

Also, the hands-on element of the course seems to appeal to those who enjoy working with their hands. The classroom barely looks like a classroom at all. It’s a bustling workshop full of students designing and creating different projects. You aren’t even sitting down too often.

“Each day is different depending on how far into each project you are. One day I’ll be designing the whole day and the next I get to fully put it onto an object, and the idea comes to life,” NHS freshman Hope Venezia said.

The class has drawn in many students lately with all these opportunities. So many, in fact, that they even had to turn some people away. This is clearly no coincidence. Graphics I alone teaches students many important skills that are relevant far beyond high school.

“Adobe's a really important product for everybody to learn. 
So whatever you're going to do in college, I think it would help the kids learn how to design. You're always going to do a presentation in class. You're going onto college, so you need to know how to put things together in an aesthetic way. I think the class is good to teach that,” George explained.