The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
By Kendra Walker
Crested Butte is not just home to extreme sports and outdoor access; it also fosters a talented and creative arts community, and students at Crested Butte Community School are finding artistic inspiration beyond the classroom and getting recognized at a regional and even state level.
The National PTA Reflections contest is a 54-year-old program that provides students with a creative outlet to express themselves through one of six art disciplines: dance choreography, film production, literature, music composition, photography and visual arts. Each year, over 300,000 students nationwide in Pre-K through Grade 12 create original works of art in response to the annual contest theme. The local PTA selects student winners in each grade division, who then have the opportunity to advance through to regional and state PTA competition levels, culminating with the national PTA contest in the spring.
This year’s theme was called “Accepting Imperfection,” and 11 CBCS student entrants won at the regional level and progressed through to the state contest. Five of those entrants won state awards, including gold winner Brody Davis, silver winners Rivkah Schneider, Avery Detlefsen, Naomi Treadwell and Ari Shabo. The five state finalists representing CBCS will have the opportunity to attend the Colorado State Awards ceremony on March 9 in Westminster. Davis’ winning visual art work will now be forwarded to the national PTA Reflections competition for judging and the national program winners will be announced in May.
“It’s fabulous to the kids in the arts also getting kudos for their efforts and getting recognized outside our local valley,” said Crested Butte PTA school liaison Leigh Paulsen. “It’s so important to celebrate all aspects of kids’ interests. The theme this year was also really significant for them, to reflect on accepting those imperfections in ourselves and others.”
“Having so many kids win regionals and advance to state was fantastic and something we hope to build upon in the coming years,” said community volunteer Melissa McVeigh, who has worked with the PTA to expand upon the local Reflections program.
Last year, the Crested Butte PTA began work on the program to get more traction with students, boost participation and increase awareness within the community. “We thought, how great would it be if we could give more kids that feeling of accomplishment and recognition, both within the larger CB community and ideally well beyond this region?” said McVeigh.
McVeigh worked with former PTA president Margaux Helvey to apply for a grant and ramp up the program, and they received $5,000 from the town of Crested Butte to use toward prizes for the student finalists, promotional materials and updates. Paulsen helped execute the program and assemble the PTA volunteer committee, and worked closely with gifted and talented teacher Stacey Pennie, who previously ran the local Reflections program. “Stacey is the primary expert on all things Reflections and has been single handedly rescue-breathing this program for the past several years,” said McVeigh.
Pennie is a major advocate for the Reflections program and encourages her students to apply every year. “It’s a fantastic opportunity for students to be recognized outside of school, to show them that they’re bigger than just the school. It shows the kids’ drive, passion and leadership and is a beautiful thing to put on their resume for college applications.”
Pennie explains that the entries must be 100% student work. “The students can’t have any help, influence or critique from outside entities,” she said. “We as teachers can let them know about the opportunity and encourage them to figure out where they want to go with it. I want them to have the opportunity to be recognized. But it must be student driven and it’s truly meant to be something that they desire to do for themselves.”
Pennie is proud of the participating students who put their work out there. “Our CBCS students often do really well at the regional level each year.”
She is also proud of their willingness to put their work out there and share personal, often vulnerable, experiences. She recalls some of the students’ entries, “Naomi has won state before and regionals multiple times. She’s great at entering work every year and does well. And Avery wrote a beautiful lyrical poem that talks about people and nature and their imperfections. She wrote about the acceptance of trees in their imperfection, using the oxymoron that imperfection is perfect in its own way. Rivkah is very open about her personal challenges and wrote a wonderful essay about them and the acceptance of herself.”
The Crested Butte PTA hopes to keep spreading awareness about Reflections so that students know the opportunity exists. The goal is to utilize community resources, such as the Center for the Arts, CB School of Dance, the Trailhead Children’s Museum and the Crested Butte art community, to shed light on Reflections and encourage participation through those outside programs as well. The local Reflections deadline for entries is every fall, typically in November, said Pennie. The Reflections theme for 2025-2026 is “I Belong!”
“I feel like this is an amazing showing for our first year of boosting the Reflections program,” said McVeigh. “If we can build on these results and get more kids interested and involved, I feel like this could really turn into something special at CBCS. And if we could get more artists from the community involved too, at some point, to champion these kids, this could turn into something really fun for the community as a whole.”
The 11 student finalists’ entries are on display in the glass cases opposite the Elementary Music room at CBCS.
