Dancing across the stage, playing interactive games in drama classes or singing in a concert; many students participate in art classes at the high school. For many, skills learned or added to at the high school are ones that could be made into a career.

A wide range of artistic students have learned skills that they want to pursue professionally. Both current students and graduates have used their high school experience to pursue these paths.

Rae Bell ‘17 has continued acting in college. She is a theater major, and though it is harder to be active in her acting career in college, she continues to audition and participate in productions.

“In college, a lot of the time auditions are self taped, where you send yourself doing sides and then you send them in, and then if they want to call you back, they call back in person but you normally don’t get a callback,” Bell said. “So you don’t usually need to leave campus to audition.”

According to Bell, the experience she is getting will benefit her later in life.

“Since I’m studying acting in school, I realize that I could not be in college and auditioning full time, but in the long run, I’m much more likely to succeed if I train,” Bell said.

Senior Sammy Davies hopes his love for jazz music can turn into a career for him. He has taken advantage of groups at the high school including the Music Collective, Concert Band and pit band. According to Davies, his high school experience has also enhanced his musical life, and his band teacher has inspired him.

“I feel like whatever I do, I try to have it have some effect on my musicality,” Davies said.

Maya Krantz ‘17, plans to have jewelry and metals be part of her life forever. She has been making jewelry for seven years and has continued to do so in college, making bracelets in the spare time she has.

“I definitely want to keep making jewelry and want it to be a part of my life forever,” Krantz said.

For Krantz, the classes she took at the high school develop her skills to strengthen her metals work. Before taking the class, she would play with her materials until she made a start of a design she wanted to finish creating. Now, Krantz said, she makes sketches before beginning a piece so she has a plan she has engineered that she can accomplish.

“In that class, Ms. Brennan made you draw what you were going to do so you would have a plan of what you wanted to do and then could execute it,” Krantz said.

Isabelle Cotney has been acting since she was a little kid and has continued it throughout her life. She has taken many classes in the high school, as well as outside of the high school. Her high school experience has helped Cotney manage her school work so she can work hard at her acting. According to Cotney, her teachers have been helpful in helping her manage school work, allowing her time for acting and auditioning outside of school.

“I take Digital Video, Choreography, my SWS English classes, and they’re extremely supportive and super understanding,” Cotney said.

Also, Cotney said she enjoys taking arts electives at the high school since they are enjoyable during the day.

According to junior Basya Klein, taking classes at the high school has allowed her to pursue art careers during high school is helping her with the stress of high school. Klein is invested in fashion and visual arts and wants to continue throughout her life.

“Ideally, I would like to end up making a living as an artist, but that’s hard,” Klein said.“I might end up working some random day job and doing art whenever I can and making that a top priority.

She has taken many visual arts classes at the high school, including sculpture, painting, drawing, printmaking and metals. She said she uses all her electives to take art classes.

Cotney is currently taking Digital Video I and is learning skills that she sees screen actors using. Cotney said an actress she looks up to is Millie Bobby Brown, and she uses skills that Cotney is also learning about.

“{Millie Bobby Brown} plays this character where she barely talks in the first season but can portray this message without saying anything,” Cotney said. “We learned about that in our digital video class, how a really good film doesn’t need dialogue to tell a story, and I hope someday, I want to be able to tell a story without any words.”