The South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities first began as an idea by Virginia Uldrick, a well-known music teacher in Greenville, S.C. Educators Jennifer Thomas and Scott Gould recently joined StoryCorps to explain the mission of the school, and Uldrick’s standards of excellence for both her students and staff.
TRANSCRIPT:
Thomas: Governor's School for the Arts and Humanities is a public residential arts high school. So, students audition in one of five art departments from all over the state of South Carolina to finish high school. So, they do their freshman and sophomore year back wherever they live in South Carolina, and then they audition in creative writing, dance, drama, music, and visual art to come to our high school for their 11th and 12th grade years. It's a public school, so there's no tuition.
Gould: It was, and it may still be one of the few public residential arts high schools in the country.
Thomas: Virginia Uldrick was a musician herself, and she started up a district-wide arts program for the school district that we are situated in right now here in Greenville. And she also started up a summer program in the arts, which was the Governor's School for the Arts in the mid-80s over summertime, like a five-week program. And then she started up this residential high school for the arts.
Gould: I remember the first time I met her, I got hired to teach creative writing in the summer program. I was in her office and she goes, “You know why you're here, Mr. Gould?” and I said, “Well, I'm here to teach creative writing.” She said, “No, you're here to change lives.”
Thomas: Oh my gosh.
Gould: I was in my 20s. I, you know, I didn't think about changing lives. But she was right, because we see when we get in front of students, these art students that she's been able to bring together, we change the arc of their lives. That first summer I taught, it was at Furman University's campus. And there was no air conditioning in the rooms, and it was blazing hot.
Thomas: Oh man.
Gould: So of course I wore shorts.
Thomas: Mm-hm.
Gould: And I got called down to her office and she said, “Have a seat.” And I said, “Okay.” She looked at me and she said, “Mr. Gould, you will not expose your legs to these children.” And I went... I-I didn't know what to say.
Thomas: Right.
Gould: So, I didn't wear shorts anymore, of course. But what I later realized is her focus was always on the students and the things that were best for them in her eyes.
Thomas: She told me once, we were working on something, I was really tired of reworking, coming back, retrying. And I said to her, “Virginia, I really think that this is good enough for what we're trying to do. I think this is good enough.” And she just looked at me, and I knew I had done/said something wrong, but I was waiting to find out what that was. And she said, “Jennifah, good enough for whom?” And she meant good enough for the students, good enough for the, you know, not good enough for her. It was not about a power trip. It was really...mediocrity, just getting, just kind of pulling it off, which really can just be fine. This was fine. She was not about that. There was never just like a, “Well, this will be okay.” It was…so, I miss that kind of, I mean, there are plenty of people who still have that kind of motivation, but she was a leader who really, kind of pulled that out of everybody around her.
Gould: If she was back, I'd thank her again.
Thomas: Yeah. Yeah, I would, too.
Gould: (laughs) And I wouldn't wear shorts.
Thomas: (laughs)
