Have you ever heard of a teacher who teaches seven different classes in the same year? Well,Mr. Vaughn does! Mr. Vaughn teaches studio art, drawing, painting, advanced drawing, advanced art (drawing and painting), digital media arts, and AP art and design here at the high school. While this may seem like an impossible workload, he gets it done with ease.
Growing up near Syracuse, our talented art teacher went to Marcellus High School. After high school, Mr. Vaughn attended Hobart and William Smith Colleges for his undergraduate degree, moving on to Rochester Institute of Technology to get his master’s degree for teaching. Having been a teacher for eighteen years, Mr. Vaughn spent seven in the Sherburne-Earlville school district, before coming to New Hartford where he has been teaching for eleven years, both at the elementary and high school for the art department.
When asked about what he likes about his career, Mr. Vaughn answered saying, “I love working with and learning from students and my colleagues.” He goes on to say, “It is not all about showing students what they are supposed to do next, it’s more about working together to create something unique.”
Mr Vaughn is grateful that he works in such a collaborative field, also explaining that since he teaches in the art department, his curriculum can be more creative and individualized to the students.
Outside of school, Mr. Vaughn loves spending time with his family. He is married with two kids, aged three and six, and also has a lot of extended family throughout the Mohawk Valley. Art runs through their family, with Mr Vaughn’s wife being an art professor at SUNY Cobleskill.
When Mr. Vaughn isn’t teaching one of his seven classes or spending time with family, he can be found in the auditorium. In his free time, Mr. Vaughn creates the set design for the New Hartford Masque productions. Each and every production is completely different. The set design job is challenging because the same set pieces are used in almost every production. Having to paint and configure the set to fit the new show’s storyline and color story requires versatility and creativity.
“I work with a great team of students and community volunteers who bring their own skills to the project,” Mr. Vaughn says. “It’s inspiring to see everyone work together towards a common goal. It’s the best, I love every minute of it.”
If you ask anyone who has met Mr. Vaughn to describe his personality, I am confident that there would be three words used: Calm, Cool, and Collected. Colleague and fellow art teacher Ms. Sullivan describes Mr. Vaughn by saying, “I like working with Mr Vaughn because he is so calm and practical, you cannot ruffle his feathers. He is very level headed and having taught with Mr Vaughn for 11 years, I appreciate that he is always calm, cool and collected in the classroom. He is so good at what he does– having to teach a million different classes and never getting flustered. I also wish I could sit in on his painting class so I could be a better painter and that he would teach me to draw caricature drawings as good and fast as he can.”
Our own Mr. Vaughn, known for taking the term “multi-task” to a different level and always being calm and deliberate in everything he does, is a vital part of our school’s art program, and will continue to help students open up to their true artistic abilities as long as he continues to teach.
