Adrienne Schorr received a B.A. in Fine Arts and Secondary Education from Lehman College, C.U.N.Y. and an M.A. in Special Education with a focus on physical and multiple disabilities from Columbia University, Teachers College to fulfill her desire to teach art in a more therapeutic/rehabilitative setting.

Adrienne began teaching art at United Cerebral Palsy of New York City’s Brooklyn Teenage and Adult program and subsequently taught in the New York City public schools for 10 years. Her experience in New York City included teaching art to multiply disabled students 5 – 21 years of age and middle school students with a wide range of learning and emotional disabilities and speech and language impairments. She taught art in the Poughkeepsie City School District for the next 20 years. This experience included elementary school for 5 years and then high school. Throughout her years of teaching the “general population” Adrienne specialized in and advocated for those students with special needs who were mainstreamed into her art classes; working closely with their teachers, families and support professionals, and often attending CSE meetings. In addition to her teaching responsibilities she acted as Advisor and Advocate of the Gay/Straight Alliance at Poughkeepsie High School.

Adrienne was an adjunct lecturer at both Queens College and Lehman College, teaching a graduate course “Visual Arts for Students With Learning Problems”. She held summer positions teaching art to incarcerated youth, mentoring teenage gifted girls, and has given private art lessons to an autistic teenager. One of the highlights of Adrienne’s teaching career was the opportunity to share her knowledge and experience in Japan when she participated in a Fulbright Memorial Fund Teacher Program in 2003. She is excited to now use her extensive experiences as an educator to advocate for students with special needs as part of SLA’s team.