Tony Ferguson on wed 31 may 06
Hi,
Say, does anyone have a list of reputable colleges that are offering an MFA online with some form of residency requirement? I am not talking the MFA in box. I am talking accountabilility, discourse, critique, interaction, reviews, presenting, etc. I saw some ads in a CM in the last year or so but can not locate them at the moment. Any help in building or finding a list would be appreciated.
Thank you and take care,
Tony Ferguson
http://www.tonyferguson.net
Tony Ferguson
...where the sky meets the lake...
Duluth, Minnesota
Artist, Educator, Web Meister
fergyart@yahoo.com
fergy@cpinternet.com
(218) 727-6339
http://www.aquariusartgallery.com
http://www.tonyferguson.net
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Snail Scott on wed 31 may 06
At 10:40 AM 5/31/2006 -0700, Tony F wrote:
> Say, does anyone have a list of reputable colleges that are offering an
MFA online with some form of residency requirement?
The Vermont College program was recommended to
me by someone. It is a stay-at-home MFA in which
you work in your own studio but have contact with
a liason person, often a faculty member of a local
institution. The person who recommended it to me
had been a liason faculty for them before. You do
go to Vermont for a short in-residence period each
year, but otherwise you stay home.
I decided it wasn't for me; I wasn't sure whether
I'd get what I wanted from such a program. One
thing that concerned me was the lack of close
interaction with instructors and other students
(something I considered a major reason for grad
school). Another was my fear that such a program
might not have much credibility if I went looking
for a teaching post. The work comes first, I think,
and the program I did pick isn't exactly one of the
big-name art schools, but I wasn't sure if a
correspondence degree was a good use of my time
and money. It's not a cheap program - about $5000
a semester, last I checked, and they don't even
provide a studio. On the other hand, if you truly
can't relocate, it might be just the thing.
-Snail
BJ Clark | Stinking Desert Ceramics on wed 31 may 06
Tony,
One of the professors at the college I'm getting my BFA at is currently
doing this program (It's through Goddard right?) that snail is talking
about.
She's quite pleased with it. It's pricey, but she can teach and get the MFA
at the same time. Pretty sweet deal. She goes there for 1 week like 4 times
a year for 2 years. She had to have a huge body of work each time as well.
She had really high praise when she got back in Feb. from the last meeting.
BJ Clark
Colorado
On 5/31/06, Snail Scott wrote:
>
> At 10:40 AM 5/31/2006 -0700, Tony F wrote:
> > Say, does anyone have a list of reputable colleges that are offering an
> MFA online with some form of residency requirement?
>
>
> The Vermont College program was recommended to
> me by someone. It is a stay-at-home MFA in which
> you work in your own studio but have contact with
> a liason person, often a faculty member of a local
> institution. The person who recommended it to me
> had been a liason faculty for them before. You do
> go to Vermont for a short in-residence period each
> year, but otherwise you stay home.
>
> I decided it wasn't for me; I wasn't sure whether
> I'd get what I wanted from such a program. One
> thing that concerned me was the lack of close
> interaction with instructors and other students
> (something I considered a major reason for grad
> school). Another was my fear that such a program
> might not have much credibility if I went looking
> for a teaching post. The work comes first, I think,
> and the program I did pick isn't exactly one of the
> big-name art schools, but I wasn't sure if a
> correspondence degree was a good use of my time
> and money. It's not a cheap program - about $5000
> a semester, last I checked, and they don't even
> provide a studio. On the other hand, if you truly
> can't relocate, it might be just the thing.
>
> -Snail
>
>
> ______________________________________________________________________________
> Send postings to clayart@lsv.ceramics.org
>
> You may look at the archives for the list or change your subscription
> settings from http://www.ceramics.org/clayart/
>
> Moderator of the list is Mel Jacobson who may be reached at
> melpots@pclink.com.
>
--
BJ Clark
Stinking Desert Ceramics
bjclark@stinkingdesert.com
www.stinkingdesert.com
Marcia Selsor on wed 31 may 06
Snail,
I have a friend who completed her MFA at 50+ thru the Vermont College
program. She flew
there several times for group critiques and did have several
liaison faculty locally. She was a collage artist.
She was very happy with that program.
Marcia Selsor
http://marciaselsor.com
On May 31, 2006, at 3:07 PM, Snail Scott wrote:
> At 10:40 AM 5/31/2006 -0700, Tony F wrote:
>> Say, does anyone have a list of reputable colleges that are
>> offering an
> MFA online with some form of residency requirement?
>
>
> The Vermont College program was recommended to
> me by someone. It is a stay-at-home MFA in which
> you work in your own studio but have contact with
> a liason person, often a faculty member of a local
> institution. The person who recommended it to me
> had been a liason faculty for them before. You do
> go to Vermont for a short in-residence period each
> year, but otherwise you stay home.
Marcia Selsor
http://marciaselsor.com
Vince Pitelka on fri 2 jun 06
Tony F. wrote:
> Say, does anyone have a list of reputable colleges that are offering an
> MFA online with some form of residency requirement?
Tony -
As you know, I never hesitate to play devil's advocate when there is a good
reason to, and in this case I think there is. Why in the world would you
even consider a distance MFA program? Why would you want anything other
than total immersion? I don't care how good the college is or how good the
teachers are or how good they say their MFA is. If you are going to go to
the trouble at all, it should be total immersion. Getting an MFA should be
a complete life-changing experience. Otherwise, why bother? Just for the
degree? Just to have those three letters after your name? I'm sorry, but
that ain't worth squat unless there is the substance and experience behind
it, and there is no way you can get an equivalent experience doing most of
the work in your own studio at home. To really make the most of the
opportunity, you need to be there in the academic studio, surrounded by
fellow students and the graduate faculty, interacting with them every day,
participating in all sorts of informal and formal group critiques, giving
and receiving inspiration and information.
As you might guess from the above paragraph, graduate school was a
thoroughly positive experience for me. It was the best thing I ever did in
my life. I really cannot imagine doing a graduate degree in art without
being there on-site at the school. If it doesn't fit into your life right
now to move somewhere else to be in residence while getting MFA, then wait
until it does.
- Vince
Vince Pitelka
Appalachian Center for Craft, Tennessee Technological University
Smithville TN 37166, 615/597-6801 x111
vpitelka@dtccom.net, wpitelka@tntech.edu
http://iweb.tntech.edu/wpitelka/
http://www.tntech.edu/craftcenter/
Ivor and Olive Lewis on sun 4 jun 06
I agree with Vince on the notion of a total immersion "Life On Campus" =
experience. Been there, done that as a mature age student. Ploughed the =
long lonely furrow of isolated distance Ed and some of the in between =
flavours as well.
Eduction is not cheap.
When paying high quality hard earned dollars for any qualification make =
sure you get all of the advantages they can buy.
Best regards,
Ivor Lewis.
Redhill,
South Australia.
Linda Arbuckle on mon 5 jun 06
I hear in some of the messages that people want to "get an MFA" in a way
that makes it sound like something you buy, a passport. A credential you buy
to get past some kind of gatekeepers.
Active participation in a good MFA program changes you and your work. You
get more career opportunities because your work has grown, your
understanding has grown, your professional practices and studio skills have
grown. Getting "MFA" after you name by itself does zip. Outside of getting a
teaching job at the college level, I don't think the ceramics world cares
whether you have an MFA, just whether you make good work (and what that is
consitutes another long discussion). But I know what my work looked like
before I studied, and I'm so thankful for that schooling and the growth it
prompted.
There was comment made about being too old and smart to do a regular MFA
program. Well, you don't know what you don't know, and people should be open
to learning from everyone, whether they're older or younger than you are.
It's bogus to think that you get too smart to go back to participating in a
learning environment. One of the joys of teaching is learning from other
people all the time. Most of them are younger, and in certain areas I know
more than they do, but in many other places they have much to offer me.
We've always had people of diverse ages in studio, and everyone has much to
contribute, and many ways to challenge each other. We like it that way. Just
like real life.
I tend to agree with Vince. In visual arts, you learn so much from seeing
other people work and solve problems. It's hard to imagine an online
distance program that offers as much as coming into studio every day and
seeing what everyone else is doing (including the undergraduates, the art
history students, the other studio disciplines), and having regular access
to community and faculty. A lot of days I have short conversations in
passing with people about what they're working on, and I like to think that
those 15-minute interchanges enlighten both of us. This happens between
everyone in studio, and over the course of a school year, constitutes a lot
of information. It's hard to find people asking the same caliber of
questions and information outside school. My mother loves all my work, and
my artist friends are usually too busy making a living in their own studio
practice to talk with me several times a week about what I'm making.
The paper MFA is not helpful. The learning and change in your understanding
and work are the real values that will give you more in your career. I'm
open to the idea that an exceptional student with an exceptional distance
program can make progress with work. I was never an exceptional student, but
a plodder who needed every help. "Distance learning" has been a buzz-word
for a lot of schools as a way to make more money w/o any more physical
facility. This is not say it couldn't offer something, but there's been a
push to bring in more students and more money, and I don't think quality has
been the primary consideration in some cases. If you want the most growth in
your work over the relatively short period of time an MFA takes, I'd
recommend going to a strong residential program with a community of
students. If this is not possible or desirable, then you have to find
another way to grow you work.
Linda Arbuckle
University of Florida Ceramics
(from my new gmail account to see just how much spam I collect from posting
on Clayart)
Maxwell, Deborah on mon 5 jun 06
Just my two cents on this subject, but Linda and Joyce has stated so
eloquently and has hit home for me.
Linda: Active participation in a good MFA program changes you and your
work. You get more career opportunities because your work has grown,
your understanding has grown, your professional practices and studio
skills have grown. Getting "MFA" after you name by itself does zip.=20
And
Joyce: I discovered that what I really wanted to do was to pot. =20
I have my BFA from a private art college in Michigan. Always wanted two
things when I had time for them: an MFA and to get back to pottery. I
was introduced to pottery when I was in junior high. About four years I
started the pottery classes and two years ago I started the MFA program
for business from Central Michigan University off campus. Both were
great and a challenge. When I failed the STATS exam, I looked at what I
really wanted to do. At the time it was a tough decisiion but throwing
pots seemed right at the time. I'm happy to say I have a small studio
(20 ft of my husband's 30 x 60 barn) and I enjoy what I do everyday and
come home and throw every night.
Some day my work will grow and who knows, maybe I'll be chasing Kelly at
Eastern., when the time is right.
Deborah J. Bassett-Maxwell
Kimball, MI
=20
-----Original Message-----
From: Clayart [mailto:CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG] On Behalf Of Linda
Arbuckle
Sent: Monday, June 05, 2006 12:07 PM
To: CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG
Subject: online MFA Colleges offering the degree?
I hear in some of the messages that people want to "get an MFA" in a way
that makes it sound like something you buy, a passport. A credential you
buy
to get past some kind of gatekeepers.
Linda Arbuckle
University of Florida Ceramics
(from my new gmail account to see just how much spam I collect from
posting
on Clayart)
________________________________________________________________________
______
Send postings to clayart@lsv.ceramics.org
You may look at the archives for the list or change your subscription
settings from http://www.ceramics.org/clayart/
Moderator of the list is Mel Jacobson who may be reached at
melpots@pclink.com.
Elizabeth Priddy on tue 6 jun 06
There was comment made about being too old and smart
to do a regular
MFA
program. Well, you don't know what you don't know, and
people should be
open
to learning from everyone, whether they're older or
younger than you
are.
It's bogus to think that you get too smart to go back
to participating
in a
learning environment.
-Linda
______________________________________
You may mean me on that. I don't think I am too old
or too smart for learning from everyone.
I do think I am too encumbered and far away from a
qualified program to drop everything and go full
immersion and so I have been considering other options
for about 5 years now.
regarding the too smart, though. That is interesting.
I do not think that traditional values associated
with being "smart" help you in art. It may increase
your range of experience and knowledge of history, but
"smart" does not make emotive work for me. If
something comes from "smart", it tends to hold little
substantive quality for me. My reaction seems to
consistently be "Oh, how clever" and not much after
that. It is kind of like vusual puns, not really a
joke, not really designed to make you laugh, just
clever.
I try very hard to relax and turn off the part of my
brain that would be the smart part when I go to work.
I find that if my mind is racing with words, the work
suffers. I sat down to paint the other day as I had
two minutes to rub together and just stopped after
about three ruined pieces. I say ruined. They would
probably sell fine and I might go ahead and fire them
to flesh out the upcoming sale...but I don't like
them. A bee, a beetle, and a snail, but no chi.
As I describerd to Vince, who still may not have heard
me, I was in real studio environment for several years
straight, so I am not just guessing about the
atmosphere. I also lived in the graduate school dorm
for two years (housing mix-up, but better digs), so
the people I hung out with in the evening were mostly
grad students.
I am not too smart to learn from everyone. But I have
other issues that make distance learning much more
attractive than going back to campus full time, which,
no matter how true my heart and committment and
dedication, ain't happening in this lifetime.
And to say that what I CAN do is not good enough or
that my work can't make the grade because I did it at
home is just wrong-headed.
E
Elizabeth Priddy
Beaufort, NC - USA
http://www.elizabethpriddy.com
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Lee Love on tue 6 jun 06
On 6/6/06, Linda Arbuckle wrote:
> But I know what my work looked like before I studied, and I'm so thankful for
>that schooling and the growth it prompted.
This is exactly how I feel about my apprenticeship.
> other people work and solve problems. It's hard to imagine an online
> distance program that offers as much as coming into studio every day and
> seeing what everyone else is doing (including the undergraduates, the art
> history students, the other studio disciplines),
Imagining is the creative aspect about thinking about a new way of
teaching. It is difficult to make something happen if we cannot
imagine it. Of course, a new way might not work for everybody. But
the thing about the internet, is that you can easily find this
minority because of the power of the internet.
What if the online program included video conferencing and the
use of different visual online technologies to help teachers and peers
communicate, possibly more frequently than they could face to face?
For example, if you are an introvert like myself, it might be easier
to get a word in edge-wise this way. If I am in a group of more than
3 people, I just listen.
Also, as mentioned previously: what if the online program
connected far flung people who are doing traditional apprenticeships?
What if they have daily face time with a Master Potter? A full day
at the wheel 6 or 7 days a week? Could that be a way to make
something better than either situation by itself?
>and having regular access
> to community and faculty. A lot of days I have short conversations in
> passing with people about what they're working on, and I like to think that
> those 15-minute interchanges enlighten both of us.
David McDonald is here in Mashiko from Arizona. We are the same
age, but he did a two year apprenticeship with my teacher 30 years
ago. I finished mine 3 years ago. He can't believe all the
changes here.
Related to the "15 minutes" Linda speaks about. He pointed out
to me during our lunch, that Jean and I are both lucky, because we are
a creative couple. Sometimes I forget, but Jean and I have one 15
minute discussion after another, all through the day.
--
Lee In Mashiko, Japan
http://mashiko.org
http://seisokuro.blogspot.com/
"The way we are, we are members of each other. All of us.
Everything. The difference ain't in who is a member and who is not,
but in who knows it and ho don't."
--Burley Coulter (Wendell Berry)
Taylor Hendrix on tue 6 jun 06
You have some really good ideas, Lee, but I wonder how appealing that would
sound to the admin of a MFA school. Wish some other group would put
something like that into opperation.
I asked Marsha if she thought I was too old to go back to graduate school.
She just looked at me. MAN, I wish I could read her mind. Anyway, I tried
to get a self study course up and running for me in my BA. I wanted to
devour everything about writing and then have time with each of the English
faculty so as to get exposure to different styles, problems, etc. After the
initial interest from my advisor, the energy fizzled. University bureacracy
is too big a ship. The steerage is slowwwwwwwwwwww. Sigh.
Taylor, in Rockport TX
Chris Campbell on tue 6 jun 06
EP wrote ...
>And to say that what I CAN do is not good enough or
that my work can't make the grade because I did it at
home is just wrong-headed<
I don't think anyone said that ...
what I hear them trying to say is that you are missing a
good 75% of the total experience by not being around
other HUMANS ... forget the stupid term 'Bricks & Mortar'
The focal point is interactions with adult humans of
all ages and talents and opinions and approaches.
I don't know why you keep arguing as you have stated
that this option is outside of your current life situation.
You don't have a dog in this fight!
Chris Campbell - in North Carolina - definitely not an MFA but
would not rule it out if the option was presented in an exciting manner.
But ... I certainly would not pay to have someone grade me over the
Internet !!
I pay to have that happen every day when someone does not buy my work.
Chris Campbell Pottery LLC
9417 Koupela Drive
Raleigh NC 27615-2233
Fine Colored Porcelain since 1989
1-800-652-1008
Fax : 919-676-2062
website: www.ccpottery.com
wholesale : www.wholesalecrafts.com
Elizabeth Priddy on tue 6 jun 06
I don't know why you keep arguing as you have stated
that this option is outside of your current life
situation.
-chris
___________________________
Because I may actually have a dog in this fight.
I may get a LA-MFA and then become part of the system
and make a program that IS worthy of the paper it is
written on.
I have accomplished harder things that going along and
getting along. And that is what it amounts to.
The first generation of LA-MFA's may just be
sacrificial lambs to progress. And the next
generation of students will reap the benefits. But
somebody will be in the first wave and I am not sure
that it will not be me. Arguing about tit helps me
form my opinions and focus.
Isn't that why you go for total immersion in the first
place. And how handy it is to have the discussion
here, with 6-10 people of various life experience and
backgrounds chiming in and all this input....
Oh my GOd, how can you have had that without a
building?!?!?
Oh yeah, the internet and people who can speak to sort
things out instead of having to do it with body
language and looks.
Maybe LA-MFA's are for people with a different skill
set than those that need to stand next to the person
talking.
I can do that. This will be my last post on it,
though, as I have got work to do. I will leave it as
this: Vince and his ilk are wrong and it will take
too long for that to come to bear as common knowledge
for this forum to handle it. So I am letting it go.
But thanks to all party-c-pants, as I have really got
a lot out of it, clarity and all that.
E
Elizabeth Priddy
Beaufort, NC - USA
http://www.elizabethpriddy.com
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Chris Campbell on wed 7 jun 06
EP writes :
>And how handy it is to have the discussion
here, with 6-10 people of various life experience
and backgrounds chiming in and all this input....
Oh my GOd, how can you have had that without a
building?!?!?<
My answer is exactly this .....
Tony C writes :
>Not only have i said before that you can
be anything you want on the Internet but
I've said it more than a dozen times- ya can
shit the fans but but ya can't shit the players.
Those that make good work, know what good
work is.<
I do not doubt there are some MFA subjects that could easily
be adapted to long distance learning ... you could blend the
two so that students would only have to attend for a shorter
period of time ... but having the guts to put your work into the
hands of people who cannot be fooled ... day after day ...
that is another story.
Chris Campbell - in North Carolina - following some
discussions on clayart is like watching mules harnessed
and trotting in the same circles grinding wheat or whatever ...
sometimes each gets the illusion of being in the lead but
most often they are watching butts and staying in the same rut.
Chris Campbell Pottery LLC
9417 Koupela Drive
Raleigh NC 27615-2233
Fine Colored Porcelain since 1989
1-800-652-1008
Fax : 919-676-2062
website: www.ccpottery.com
wholesale : www.wholesalecrafts.com
Lee Love on wed 7 jun 06
On 6/7/06, Taylor Hendrix wrote:
> You have some really good ideas, Lee, but I wonder how appealing that would
> sound to the admin of a MFA school. Wish some other group would put
> something like that into opperation.
Probably the first time it is done, it won't be through a
school of fine arts. But it is coming for sure. We will see it in
our lifetime.
> I asked Marsha if she thought I was too old to go back to graduate school.
> She just looked at me. MAN, I wish I could read her mind. Anyway, I tried
> to get a self study course up and running for me in my BA.
My apprenticeship was the most difficult educational
experience I ever had so far in my life. I can't recommend it for
most people. Comparing notes with David's experience of 30 years ago,
things really changed after my teacher's Ningen Kokuho status.
But after that, I have no doubt about my devouring an MFA program. ;^)
--
Lee in Mashiko, Japan
http://mashiko.org
My google Notebooks:
http://tinyurl.com/e5p3n
"Let the beauty we love be what we do." - Rumi
pdp1@EARTHLINK.NET on thu 8 jun 06
One sidelight, which for me would be an
impediment...
Is that I do not like being in institutional
buildings...or institutional settings...at least
not as they seem to have been in my lifetime
anyway.
I never did, and I was aware of this when I was
first forced to 'go' to school.
Amid the many layers of atmosphere one finds in
them, is a strata of supression, and of
disquieting compromise and surrender,
stupifaction, awkward compensitory disingenu,
falseness generally, contributed to
maybe unconsciously by ( all the various stratum
of ) the victims' cumulative (and laregly
unconscious) qualities of presence...qualities of
experience...or of all the
various penitants who have spent however long
figeting or diminishing themselves or putting on
the false face
there in pursuit of some abstractions they were
taught to value more than what not being 'there'
could have been 'worth'.
Now some places I am sure are different than
others in this way...meaning, some are even
'worse' than others.
Some kinds of places of course are fine, and happy
on all levels.
But any time I have ever had to go to any sort of
enclosed 'formalized' place where groups of people
have to wait
tediously and with discomfort from their own, and
from one another's
presence for something to get dolled out, and from
the thing itself they are 'in'...DMV, Church,
Court, Schools, Colleges,
Social Security applicant's Buildings, Concerts,
City, State or Federal
Government Buildings, Hospitals, I tend to become
quite aware
of it, and, for it to mobilize a kind of
anxiousness in me...and anxiousness to get 'out'.
I have never visited a prison, but I would expect
about the same kinds of feelings to start welling
up in me...
Small 'Community Centers' do not tend to have this
effect...
Acacia groves would not have this effect...
"Bad JuJu"...
No thanks...
Brick and Mortar' universities, and definitely
grammar schools, middle shools, high schools of
just about any description where the victims never
got to 'be' there because in any real way of
wanting TO be 'there', I would tend to merely
fantasize
about really 'good' Tornadoes, Earthquakes, or
'The Wrecking Ball' swinging from some truely
lovely old Oil seeping, hot Metal smelling Steam
Crane's long cabled Arm...as every cell in my Body
clamored for me to "GET OUT"..!
Lol...
The 'International Correspondant's School', (
"I.C.S." as they were often known, ) or rather,
their Text Books, at one time were truely
excellent for any subject they may have elected to
cover, and at one time, by golly, they covered a
lot of subjects, too.
One could not ask for kinder, more elucidating,
careful and well written, earnest, no nonesense
Books.
If one were to be able to start a 'new'
Civilization, or rather, start a Civilization in
the first place, one would do well to bring some
gamut of
these...
I would not hesitate to base any initial (or
subsequent) foray into any subject, on their
writings, and, I would never be disappointed,
either.
The 'rest' of course, was up to you...
Similarly, with the old 'Audels' Books...
You learn those, by gosh you could breeze through
any germain 'tests'...
And with practice, one goes on from there
nicely...dealing with the actual things or
processes in question.
So for me, if there were an Occupation I was
interested to learn..and I could not find handy
practioners sympathetic to my interests, and if I
could send off and get the quality of Books the
old "I.C.S." had at one time...and as well have
some occasional Letters to and from knowledgeable
others somewhere...
I would be quite content, and do very well with
it...even if I were on the Planet 'Mars'...and did
not get to have much for real time others looking
in.
Later, when knowing more, or knowing enough, if I
were to visit others similarly occupied, I would
be able to learn more in ten seconds, than a
neophite would in months of acedemia, or
apprentiseship.
Receptivity and having some real basis or
experience TO learn, is not at all something a
'school' can do for one, and in fact, school ( in
the banal sense, ) is
predicated on that very absense, or else no one
would be able to stand it.
Love,
Phil
Las Vegas
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