{"id":7119,"date":"2017-11-03T21:18:42","date_gmt":"2017-11-04T01:18:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/?p=7119"},"modified":"2026-01-09T13:22:38","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T18:22:38","slug":"students-prepare-entries-art-military-child-contest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/students-prepare-entries-art-military-child-contest\/","title":{"rendered":"Students prepare entries for Art of the Military Child contest"},"content":{"rendered":"

November, recognized as Military Family Appreciation Month, is the perfect time for students to begin working on illustrations for the school division\u2019s annual Art of the Military Child art contest. Open to all Virginia Beach City Public Schools (VBCPS) students, the contest features artwork related to being a military child.<\/p>\n

Addyson Stradling, a Shelton Park Elementary fifth-grader, already has titled her artwork-in-progress, \u201cReal Heroes Aren\u2019t in Hollywood, They\u2019re in the Navy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\""<\/p>\n

\u201cI said that because they deserve a lot of recognition. Like other stars, they are not in Hollywood,\u201d said Stradling. \u201cThe artwork is dedicated to my father and all the other people in the Navy that work very hard and have to be away from their families for a while.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stradling\u2019s work features a U.S. Navy deep sea diver to represent the work of her father.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to be a deep sea diver too, because I want to follow my father\u2019s path. I\u2019ve always loved swimming,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Calhoun\u2019s dad is also the inspiration for his Art of the Military Child entry.<\/p>\n

The Bayside Elementary third-grader explained, \u201cHe\u2019s just become a Chief Petty Officer so I have the United States Navy symbol that he wears on his hat and on\u00a0his pin, and his division, the Greyhawks.\u201d The eagle in the background is there \u201cto represent America, not just the USN,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

\""<\/p>\n

Calhoun and Stradling are among the students from schools citywide in Leigh Drake\u2019s gifted visual arts class at Old Donation School. It\u2019s an art project that Drake incorporates in her lessons every year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s important,\u201d she said. \u201cI know a lot of our students have military backgrounds and they deal with the deployments and the heartache. It\u2019s an emotional thing. I think with that and the connection with art, they can create emotional, powerful pieces visually rather than through words. I think that\u2019s something great for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The connection is not restricted to military dependents.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of students have dealt with the heartache of losing friends who have moved or they know what their friends are going through,\u201d said Drake.<\/p>\n

Kevin Dison, a third-grader at Christopher Farms Elementary, is illustrating a scene from his friend Jeremiah\u2019s life.<\/p>\n

\""<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is my friend waving bye-bye to his dad in the plane. He\u2019s a little sad because his dad is leaving.\u201d<\/p>\n

Likewise, Kempsville Meadows Elementary fifth-grader Jayden Yoon remembers being nearby when his friend called his mom who was deployed overseas to Japan.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just drew a picture of him calling his mom and, on the other side, I\u2019m going to draw his mom talking to him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Military deployments are a common theme for art contest submissions, like the completed piece Drake shared which featured a handwritten message in the corner.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome parents come home at night but mine is too far to do that. That\u2019s OK. He\u2019s still here with us and I know it,\u201d wrote Kaitlin Salazar-Mesina, Pembroke Elementary third-grader, in her artwork featuring people holding American flags and sitting near a tree with a yellow-ribbon tied around the trunk.<\/p>\n

\""<\/p>\n

In the artist statement accompanying the artwork, Salazar-Mesina described what the piece means to her: \u201cI did this piece because when my dad was deployed, I felt like I was completely petrified. Then I read a book that a girl felt the same exact way! Then I learned that when someone you love is away from you, they\u2019re still inside your heart. Whenever I look at [this piece], it reminds me my dad is with me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Holland Elementary third-grader Eunice Manlangit also thinks of her father often when he is at sea as a chef for the U.S. Merchant Marines.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy drawing is about a girl crying because her dad is in the military and he is away. I added these lines to make it seem like she\u2019s thinking, like memories. There is a picture of her dad, of her and her dad, and this is a picture of all the places her dad has gone,\u201d she said pointing to the globe marked with X\u2019s.<\/p>\n

\""<\/p>\n

Each year, Drake is struck by the emotions the art project evokes in students.<\/p>\n

\u201cEspecially at a young age, for them to be creating such powerful pieces and having that connection to it, they surprise me. They create successful pieces every year,\u201d she said. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t have known it\u2019s such a deep connection and all that pain from behind is brought through with their artwork.\u201d<\/p>\n

Entries to the Art of the Military Child art contest are reviewed by judges, and winning artwork and other select pieces are displayed at Lynnhaven Mall throughout the month of April in recognition of The Month of the Military Child. Entries may also be selected for submission to the Military Child Education Coalition, a national organization that features student artwork in their publications and on their website.<\/p>\n

The public art exhibit in the spring is an aspect of the contest Stradling likes because of what it conveys to military servicemembers.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think every student, whether they are connected to the military or not, should enter the contest because a lot of military soldiers come in and they get to look at your art and they\u2019ll be very happy that everyone supported them. It\u2019s worth it because of how hard they work to keep America an awesome place. Without them, we wouldn\u2019t be America: The Land of the Free; we\u2019d just be America.\u201d<\/p>\n

\""<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

November, recognized as Military Family Appreciation Month, is the perfect time for students to begin working on illustrations for the school division\u2019s annual Art of the Military Child art contest. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":7124,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[81,118,84,136,146,111],"class_list":["post-7119","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-bayside-elementary","tag-christopher-farms-elementary","tag-kempsville-meadows-elementary","tag-military","tag-old-donation-school","tag-pembroke-elementary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7119","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7119"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7119\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14687,"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7119\/revisions\/14687"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7119"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7119"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7119"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}