STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK

The Sun Valley Museum of Art will hold the inaugural Wendy Pesky Educator Summit on Monday and Tuesday, June 9 and 10.

The free summit, supported in part by a grant from the Wood River Women’s Foundation, is designed to show Blaine County educators across all subjects how to integrate the arts into their teaching.

The Summit honors Wendy Pesky, a former SVMoA board member and passionate advocate for arts education, celebrating her dedication and years of service to Sun Valley Museum of Art and the field of education.

In addition to the WRWF grant, The Summit is being made possible by a generous donation from the Pesky Family Foundation.

“We are profoundly inspired by the Pesky family’s remarkable dedication to education—through the Lee Pesky Learning Center, the Pesky Award for Inspirational Teaching at Boise State University and now this wonderful gift supporting SVMoA’s Wendy Pesky Educator Summit,” said SVMoA Executive Director Jennifer Wells Green. “This initiative supports teachers and benefits all students in the Wood River Valley.”

The Wendy Pesky Educator Summit, initially conceived by former SVMoA Learning & Engagement Director Sophie Sawyers, will be led by Sawyers and current Learning & Engagement Director Dianne Sanchez Shumway. It is modeled after The Community Library’s Early Literacy Summit.

Building on SVMoA’s long history of supporting arts education, the SVMoA Wendy Pesky Educator Summit will explore research-backed strategies for incorporating visual arts into subjects such as math, science, social studies and language arts. Sessions will emphasize critical thinking, creative problem-solving and social-emotional learning.