They make a way. - Maryland Institute College of Art

Eric Hooper ’01 MA, TEACHING
Principal, Pathways School / Silver Spring, MD
“The biggest thing that MICA taught me is that there are no
mistakes. Those are problems to be solved. That stuck with me.”
Out of ten siblings, only a pair made it through
college, and Eric Hooper ’01 was one of them.
Perhaps that is why the Washington, DC, native has
such a fire in his belly for teaching and inspiring. He
uses art and his training at MICA to reach students
that the Maryland educational system has given up
on—students with anger issues, depression, attention
deficit disorders, and other challenges. Hooper is
principal of the Silver Spring, MD, Pathways School,
which uses a model that includes small class size,
flexible learning models, job training, and intensive
counseling to meet emotionally challenged students
“where they are” and prepare them for success.
Though he had earned an associate degree and was
already working at Pathways, Hooper wanted to find
a way to pursue both his passion for working with
young people and his creative impulse. He enrolled in
MICA’s BFA/ MA program in Teaching, and credits
department head Dr. Karen Carroll and the rest of
the faculty with helping him learn that he could
simultaneously expand his artistic horizons and solve
educational problems. He incorporated that balance
into the way he worked with students as he interned
in Baltimore, and then in his role as a full-time art
teacher at Pathways after graduation.
Shocked that many of his students couldn’t even
look in a mirror as he tried to get them to create
self-portraits, Hooper soon became known for using
the creative process to help students who had given
up on education find a way to re-engage. His fierce
advocacy for students led the school to appoint him
vice-principal, and then principal. Today, he leads 30
staff members—including teachers, a job coach, a
work crew supervisor, and a transition specialist—
who work with students on multiple levels to ensure
that they can become productive citizens and live
out their potential using their talents. Pathways’
goal is to ensure that their students graduate with
a job in addition to their diploma.
Hooper’s artistic training at MICA formed a foundation
for how he performs his job. Students with problems
who make it to his office are sometimes surprised
to discover that they often aren’t going to get a
lecture, but instead be encouraged to start a “visual
journal,” drawing in the blank notebooks Hooper
keeps in his office. The practice, which he imported
directly from his MICA assignments, helps students
release the frustration built up because they can’t
express themselves, whether they choose to share
what they have created or not. Most of the time, he
says, students return to ask for an additional book
after they have filled the first one up.
HOOPER’S OFFICE IS FULL OF ART, INCLUDING
DRAWINGS, ART BOOKS, NOTEPADS, AND HIS
OWN VISUAL JOURNAL FROM HIS MICA DAYS.
Even his staff members have been affected by
Hooper’s MICA education, coming to him for their
own “teaching moments”—the solutions-based
vernacular he built into the school’s culture as an
alternative to talking about challenging situations
solely as problems. And even though his job requires
a lot of dedication, he still manages to squeeze in
time to create his own art.
EMPOWERMENT
MARYLAND INSTITUTE COLLEGE OF ART 2012 ANNUAL REPORT
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