Lillian Nave encourages her students to change the world for the better as soon as they set foot on campus. Her Art, Religion & Society First Year Seminar engages the students with the Boone community and the world at large through the visual arts. From gallery shows to student-made documentary films, and from Boone to New York City and Kabul, Afghanistan, students learn what a valuable tool art can be to communicate ideas, culture and emotion.
Lillian has been teaching at Appalachian State since 2007 and has taught in the First Year Seminar program since 2009 where she is currently a senior lecturer. She founded the ArtHaus Residential Learning Community and was awarded RLC Partner of the Year in 2012 for her work with the ArtHaus students. Before coming to Appalachian, she taught at Assumption College in Worcester, Massachusetts and the State University of New York in Oneonta, NY. She also enjoys giving public lectures about art from around the world and has lectured at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. She is a member of the International Arts Movement and has recently given talks about innovative teaching strategies and civic engagement in Athens, Greece, South Africa and Australia.
She asserts, "I want to cultivate creativity in my courses and that includes challenging my students to take risks, embrace failure and learn from their mistakes, all in an environment of growth." Each class is a new journey in which Lillian and her students learn and create knowledge together, where Lillian acts more like a curator of information rather than an instructor. In her class, the students lead, and the class itself becomes and instrument of learning, change, development and growth for the student.