Instructors

Amalia Wills | BFA in Studio Art | Teaches Beginning Ceramics

"I took my first ceramics class at Austin Peay in 2017 and fell in love with it. I enjoy the tactility and responsiveness of clay, and the gratification of watching a form change on the wheel."

Eboné Amos | MFA in Dance: Performance and Choreography, Florida State University | Teaches Ballet, Contemporary and Jazz

"As an instructor, I am interested in individuality. My primary goal as an instructor is to cultivate an environment where my students can find validity in their dance abilities through exploration and self-discovery."

Dillon Ward | Professional Filmmaker | Teaches The Short Film

"I was first introduced to filmmaking the summer before 5th grade when I took a stop motion animation class. The camera we used took floppy disks, and I can still remember the stacks and stacks of floppy disks everyone had next to their computer while editing."

Karen Orozco | BFA | Teaches Digital Photography

"The hardest part of being an artist is learning how to accept mistakes you make and develop from them. Staying motivated and on task is also hard; especially with all the demands of deadlines, school, work, and family."

Mary Biggers | Knitting Extraordinaire | Teaches Beginning Knitting

"Knitting in a group has always been a joyful experience, people doing what I love and teaching each other different ways of doing or looking at projects."

Shana Thornton | Writer and Owner of Thorncraft Publishing | Teaches Creative Writing Basics, Creative Writing for Military and Families and Fiction Writing

"Both reading and writing have always been a big part of my life and my routines. Writing is a practice, and many parts of it become better with time and effort."

Rachel Qualls | BFA | Teaches Art for Children and Art for Teens

"My mom always encouraged me and my brother to draw and make things, so I think I knew I was an artist from the time I was very young. Middle school is when I knew I wanted to be an art teacher."

Tim Pafford | Professional Artist | Teaches Drawing and Mixed Media Painting

"I started drawing cartoons about age 5 and loved it. I especially love to work with mixed media. I specialize in watercolor, oils and pencil."

Mikhaila Ferguson | Current APSU Dance Student | Teaches Creative Movement

"I knew I was a dancer because at one point in my life, I was not dancing and I knew that I was missing something that was really important to me."

Joanna Grisham | MFA | Teaches Creative Writing

"From my earliest memories, I was always creating characters and building worlds, but I didn’t know much about creative writing until I took an intro class in college. The first short story I ever wrote was in that intro class. My professor submitted it for a scholarship, and I won. I was shocked. I didn’t know anyone would care about anything I’d written. I had only ever written for myself."

Community School of the Arts Instructors