DAWN KANESHIRO

These people were probably not taking her class serious. In my class, only the people who barely showed up disliked her. She allows you to just walk out of the class at any time to take a break, anyone can talk whenever they want. She does a great job answering questions. If you like art and will probably not miss every other day, take Dawn's class, you'll have fun a get a B at least if you try.

I believe Dawn has the best of intentions, but I'm not so sure she should be teaching. I agree with the review that says she was unclear on how to use some of the supplies, and that she favors experienced artists. There were some students that had a tendancy to annoy her, but instead of asking them to leave, or giving them an ultimatum, she would torment them back. She had maybe 3 or 4 students that bothered her, and she kept this ongoing grudge, and wouldnt just let it go. I had a really hard time enjoying this class because of this silly back and forth banter between she and some of the students. I think its important for a teacher to be not only mature, but professional, and playing back and forth "no YOU said that..." games is rediculous. She often would come by to check on our table, and would start telling us things like how she and her husband interacted. She told me that she thought it wasnt enough that her husband brings her breakfast in bed every weekend morning because "its only oatmeal and fruit", and all I could think to say was "I think I would be happy with it... now about this project..." If you are mature enough to handle a teacher that can sometimes be rather petty, it's not a bad class to take. But if you're looking for a good art class to fill a GE, I'd suggest looking around for other teachers, because CCSF has some really good ones as well.

Dawn is a nice lady, but a very poor teacher. She has a hard time completing sentences, often stumbling over words which strongly detract from her intended message. Furthermore, the message she does eventually, circuitously, convey is generally cloudy and unhelpful. Basically she assigns a project, shows some slides and sends us on our way. There was never a clear objective on any assignments, I didn't know why I was doing what I was doing or what I was supposed to be learning. Dawn's idea of good composition seems to simply be symmetry, which she constantly refers to as "balance." This was a basic design class that used a lot of guache. As I've since learned, guache is very difficult to mix. Her demonstration lasted about four minutes. We were required to get some of the most expensive guache, which I was forced to burn through quickly because I was unclear on how to properly use it. On her behalf, she is a very generous grader, and lenient when it comes to absences and tardies. I would recommend this class only to experienced artists who just need to get this class out of the way, because you can get an easy A, and she favors you guys heavily. But if you are in it to learn and you want to be creative, absolutely skip her class.