Kaleidoscope marks 20 colorful years

SANDPOINT — It’s hard to fathom that, in a place where elementary school hallways are now commandeered as student art galleries, there was a time when the visual arts weren’t a part of going to school in Bonner County.

It wasn’t for lack of teacher interest — instructors did what they could with what they had to work with — it was a dearth of basic materials that held things back. Even in the schools that were lucky enough to have a few stacks of construction paper and some extra markers lying around, art lessons lacked a foundation in the fundamentals.

In 1989, the Pend Oreille Arts Council (POAC) and the Community Assistance League (CAL) turned things around with a program called Kaleidoscope. One couple that had a foot in both camps was Bob and Sally Lindemann.

During his lifetime, Bob made waves on the cultural scene with bold graphic statements that caused the viewer to rethink any pre-existing notions about art. Working together, the Lindemanns used this same brand of outside the box thinking to create a visual arts curriculum and deliver it to local elementary students.

“The thing that got Bob and I going was visiting the schools and seeing that they didn’t have any art materials,” said Sally, a CAL member who became the first Kaleidoscope director when the program was launched 20 years ago. “We started out by just doing third grade in the beginning and we stuck to schools that were right in town.”

Once the word got out, interest from parents, teachers and volunteers spurred Kaleidoscope forward into additional schools.

Bob Lindemann led the first training sessions for volunteers, many of whom were pulled from the ranks of POAC and CAL in order to get the program rolling. As schools were added and more volunteers signed up, teacher training workshops also were led by local artist Sharon Gunter, who went on to become the art specialist at Farmin-Stidwell Elementary School.

By 1991, Kaleidoscope classes for fourth grade were added, with fifth-graders brought on in 2000 and sixth-grade included in 2003.

As Kaleidoscope celebrates two decades of teaching art, the program now serves more than 55 classrooms in 10 elementary schools across the county’s two school districts. In total, more than 1,300 students sit down with a Kaleidoscope art teacher every month of the school year.

Deb Lafrenz has been a co-director of the program since 1994, when it was decided that two people were needed to administer the growing number of classes and the larger roster of volunteers. Prior to establishing the two-director structure, the program was led in turns by Sally Lindemann, Denise Huguenin and Ginny Jensen.

Lafrenz started out as one of the first Kaleidoscope volunteers, taught by Bob Lindemann himself in one of the early training sessions.

“Deb has been a co-director for 15 years, so she has the world record,” said Kathy Borders, who has shared those duties with Lafrenz since 1998.

“I keep coming back because of the kids,” Lafrenz said. “I used to teach at the old Hope School and I missed working with students.”

She is not the only former teacher — or returning volunteer — to get swept up and held fast by Kaleidoscope, according to Borders.

“We have a very high return rate for our volunteers,” the co-director said. “Between retired teachers, artists and parents who want to help out in their kids’ classrooms, we tend to do pretty well.”

In fact, the retention rate for the 60 Kaleidoscope volunteers that fan out to Bonner County elementary schools each year is about 70 percent. Professional artist Leata Judd has volunteered at Southside School for more than a decade. Another bounce-back instructor is Amy O’Hara, who has been teaching the art curriculum at Washington School for the past five years.

“I started when my daughter was in third grade and stayed on because I liked it so much,” she said. “The kids are into it — they’re even interested in the art history.

“The fundamentals of art are really being taught,” added O’Hara, who, like other volunteers, attended a half-day training session where instructors work through the material they will share in the classroom. “I look at these lessons and think, ‘Wow! Somebody has spent a ton of time on this.’ It’s a well-rounded and well-thought-out program. Line, color, composition, art history — they thought of everything.”

“Kaleidoscope has been such a positive situation,” founding director Sally Lindemann said. “People who thought they couldn’t teach art found out they could and then it became infectious. And, of course, the kids love it.

“It gives them a wonderful chance to learn the fundamentals and build on them,” she continued. “It’s not just, ‘It’s Friday — get your crayons out and color for an hour.’”

For the first 10 years, all of the art materials were stored at Farmin-Stidwell. But now, with ream upon ream of paper, a river of paint and 1,000 pounds of clay involved every year, those supplies are kept at each school in a designated “Kaleidoscope Closet.” The program added Heather Hellier two years ago to help the co-directors keep track of ordering those items and to assist in the organization and training of volunteers.

Apart from its celebrated performance series, POAC’s longest-running show has been its partnership with CAL to take Kaleidoscope to the schools every year.

“From the very beginning, this program was created with a clear vision in mind — giving our local kids the very best in arts education,” said Kim Queen, executive director for POAC. “That vision still shines brightly today, maybe now more than ever as funding for the arts in schools gets harder to come by. It takes an army of dedicated and energetic volunteers to pull off Kaleidoscope and you will not find a more committed band of troops.”

For more information about CAL, POAC and Kaleidoscope, visit: www.calsandpoint.org or www.artinsandpoint.org