Whether you see him in the hallway, have his class, or just follow his Instagram account, ceramics teacher Bryan Lloyd has created a positive environment with his art.
Ceramics has always been a passion of Lloyd’s. He began teaching at a private studio, then moved his teaching to a small catholic school and then to Lawrence Free State High School for seven years. Lloyd then moved to teach at Mill Valley at the beginning of last school year.
The Ceramics Instagram began when Lloyd taught ceramics at Lawrence Free State and continued it when he moved to Mill Valley. Lloyd uses Instagram to share student’s work and let students know about upcoming events and days.
“I use social media as a tool to show off the program and to highlight all of the good work that students are doing, and put it out there,” Lloyd said. “It’s very risky to put [artwork] out there because people might think your students aren’t doing good enough work. [It’s important to] show parents, the community and the kids that their artwork and what happens in this room, should be celebrated.”
Lloyd’s passion for making art and clay reflects in his students’ work and enjoyment in the class.
“I love being in the art room, and I hope I help students love being in the art room too. So I can’t hide my passion. My passion is clay and working with people,” Lloyd said.
For Lloyd, making people happy is easy and a way to make a bad day better.
“I’m excited about coming to work every day, and I love working with clay,” Lloyd said. “I try to fist-bump kids in the hallway and try to make people feel good about coming to school, which sometimes can feel like a hard place to be, or where you feel like you’re alone. But I try to meet people where they’re at.”
For senior Madelyn Shimmel, Lloyd’s positivity helps her succeed in class. She also thinks Lloyd is great at enforcing the deadlines of his class in a fun way.
“He’s really bubbly and is a really fun teacher because he’s not insanely strict, but also stern,” Shimmel said. “He wants you to get the work done, he wants you to have fun, he wants you to try new and difficult things and he wants you to mess up and fail and learn from it and do it again.”
Senior Max Henson has also felt a positive impact from Lloyd.
“I would say it’s just really fun. I love Lloyd as a person, he’s just really sweet. Anytime you ask for help, he’ll help you. He’ll always be there to help,” Henson said.
Lloyd wants his students to be committed to the class so that in the future they can teach others the skills he taught them.
“What I want for the program is to have students that are really technically proficient,” Lloyd said. “When students want to put in the hours and they want to come in during seminar and students want to grow their skills, then you have a program with a lot of students with great skills to build. What happens then is other students see experienced students work, and they get inspired by it. Having some students that take the class multiple times and can inspire others to really stretch their skills is what I see for the Ceramics Department.”
For Shimmel, the way Lloyd teaches makes the ceramics room a good environment.
“I had a different teacher for ceramics one, we were not allowed to touch the wheels, we didn’t throw at all,” Shimmel said. “Lloyd seems to let the younger kids throw on the wheel and get more comfortable with it. Going into advanced ceramics with Lloyd I felt really out of place because I had never thrown on a wheel or done some of the stuff that he was expecting us to be able to do, but he was really good about guiding you into it. I think that the reason he’s so popular with the students is because he’s like a friend.”
Looking ahead to ceramics’ future. Currently, a ceramics club is being up for consideration for the school board to approve. Lloyd would use this as a place to improve student’s skills and help them build stronger bonds.
“Having a ceramics club was something that students asked me about almost from day one,” Lloyd said. “Having it be something that builds involvement in the program is really what I would like to have. [A group] students that find joy in working with clay and find a place where they can be themselves and celebrate being themselves.”
