Student Profile

Annie Shelley

Primary and Secondary School Art Teacher
Graduate Diploma in Visual Art

I came to Curtin in order to fulfill a long held dream of studying Art, and to add to my qualifications and become a Visual Art Teacher.

Initially I was completely daunted by being back at university after a twenty-five year gap. I was also very intimidated being a post-graduate student in a subject area different to my initial degree. But my interest in the subject area was immense and my fellow students were wonderful and I ended up having the time of my life.

The staff at Curtin were really understanding and helpful and its due to them that I kept going and got good results. My supervisor played a huge part in this as did the coordinator of post grad studies.

The highlight of my time was working together with the other post grad students and learning from them. The times I enjoyed the most was in our studio, making art, talking and exchanging ideas. I don't think I would have been able to finish without the support that they gave to me.

I now have a job teaching Visual Art at a small independent school. I teach from year 4 through to year 12.

Do I think the degree helped me in my career path? Absolutely. The Graduate Diploma was twofold for me: one, it gave me a year of making art in an academic environment; and two, it was vocational in that it added to my teaching qualifications and enabled me to teach Art.

I'd highly recommend the degree to others though I would warn them too that it's a huge amount of work. I now completely have the studying bug and am looking forward to taking my art research further!