Trintje Jansen, who has been teaching and supervising student teachers in the Art Education Department for over twenty-five years, was chosen by May Chau (BFA 2007) as the subject of a paper she wrote for a graduate course at Boston University in the fall 2009 semester, entitled “Trintje Jansen – My Inspiration and My Teacher-Hero”.  May writes that Trintje was “a pivotal force and influence on my decision to change my career path from sales to art education.”  

When May first enrolled in Trintje’s Continuing Education course Drawing for the First Time, she was making a transition from a ten-year career in sales and marketing to what she hoped would be a career in the arts.  Drawing for the First Time is a course for those who have little or no drawing experience.  May found Trintje’s course “unlike any art class I [had] ever taken” in the way Trintje fostered open-ended discovery.  As a result of the course, May decided to apply to MassArt, as other Drawing for the First Time students have done, and she majored in Art Education, ultimately being supervised by Trintje in her student teaching placement in Cambridge. May is now teaching at Somerville High School.

Many of us have had teachers who are heroes to us, and it is nice that in this case the student acknowledged it.