Student artwork celebrates stories at presidential library

For years, an art teacher and a TAG teacher at Jill Stone Elementary School at Vickery Meadow had been collaborating on projects and, this March, they came together again for their biggest one yet—creating ornaments for the holiday season to be displayed at the George W. Bush Presidential Library.

Visual arts teacher Natalie Hebert and Talented and Gifted teacher Angela Mcilveene have worked together for years, first at Geneva Heights Elementary School and now at Jill Stone, collaborating on projects that involve research and art. Hebert has been a teacher with Dallas ISD for most of her nine years in the profession, and Mcilveene has been a teacher for 18 years.

Every year, the center invites a school to create the ornaments that are used to decorate the courtyard trees during the holidays, and this year, it was up to Hebert’s and Mcilveene’s students. The ornaments and other decorations around the center and presidential library revisit the  themes from Bush’s time in office, cycling through them every eight years. 

“Our school was the only elementary school and the only Dallas ISD school to participate, making this an especially unique and exciting opportunity for our students!” McIlveene  said. “It’s very special.”

The theme for this year is 2003: A Season of Stories, which is why the second- through fifth-grade students researched the theme and then picked from about 100 books one that had a particular meaning to them so they could recreate it as an ornament. The teachers met several times with Bush library staff during the months leading to the project and then worked with the students in the “presidential art club” to create 60 ornaments. 

“The students committed to three weeks after school to plan and create their ornaments,” Hebert said. “The ornaments were wooden, so it was a new type of media for them to work with. It was a learning curve, but they did fantastic.” 

Students painted either the cover and the back of their chosen book or could paint an open book with an image from inside the book that was meaningful to them and also add a few little details and their names, Hebert said. 

The students also had the opportunity to go with Hebert and McIlveene and Principal Selena King on a field trip to the center to see their ornaments decorating the tree. They toured the museum, including the full-size replica of the oval office, made presidential decisions in the interactive Critical Decision Points Theatre, and had warm cookies and milk next to their ornaments. Students were given tickets to the library so they could visit with their families.

“It was a proud and inspiring moment for our students and school community,” Hebert said. 

When the decorations are taken down after the end of year celebrations, the ornaments will be returned to the students,who will have bragging rights that their artwork was displayed at one of the only 15 presidential libraries in the United States.