Art Coordinator of Arts Builds Skills Initiative

Friendly, Compassionate, Sentimental, Talkative, Understanding

Writing (literally. My handwriting is pretty good, and I also love expressing myself through words)

Deb Miksa lives in Morristown, Tennessee where she is the Art Coordinator of the Arts Build Skills Initiative with HC*EXCELL, Hamblen County’s Educational Foundation. As an elementary school teacher in Illinois, she started both the All-Day Kindergarten program and the Pre-K 3 program. She also taught visual art classes to students in K-8.

Upon moving to Tennessee and realizing the lack of formal arts programming in local elementary schools, she began working with the Arts Build Skills program, leading a committee of artists, educators, community members, and administrators, towards incorporating the arts into the school curriculum and increasing the exposure of the arts in the community. The Arts Build Skills initiative has hosted, the Crayola creatED Arts Integration training for teachers across the district for 2 years. The ABS committee has helped teachers to comprehend the importance of the arts in children’s lives and education. She feels that the process of creating art is more important than the result and that children need an emotional, physical, and mental outlet to help them express their feelings and think creatively.

Deb serves on 3 boards in Hamblen County and is a member of 5 committees, including Girl’s Inc., Encore Theatrical Company, Keep Morristown Hamblen Beautiful, P-16 Council, Douglas Cherokee After School Steering Committee, Student Mental Health Forum, Council of Catholic Women, and THRIVE Youth Forum. She is a high school Youth Group leader and a Mentor with the Tennessee Promise Program.