Amy Pfeiler-Wunder, Assistant Professor

Amy Pfeiler-Wunder, assistant professor at Kutztown University of Pennsylvania earned her masters and PhD from the University of Iowa in Art Education and Teaching and Learning. While pursuing her masters and PhD she stayed active in the public schools, imagining, sharing stories, and making art with pre-K-9th grade students in various settings for thirteen years. In 2006, was recognized as Iowa’s Outstanding Elementary Art Educator. In 2007, she received the Western Region Outstanding Elementary Award from the National Art Education Association. Currently, she works as the advisor with the National Art Education Association Student Chapter Presidential Team.

Dr. Wunder’s research examines how children negotiate identity, power and class in the complex culture of the art room through the lens of class. She also examines how definitions of ‘child artist’ are negotiated in educational settings and how the art curriculum unfolds and is interpreted through the lens of socioeconomic status. She presents annually at local and national conferences and professional development workshops.

She works closely with Dr. Marilyn Stewart with The Dinner Party Institute focused on feminist pedagogy. She is currently conducting a joint research project with a Kutztown University graduate student, focused on the relationship between theory and practice in the art room. As an artist she creates artist books and collage focused on the complexities and tensions of being teacher/researcher/artist/mother/
daughter/woman… When summer arrives she writes and spends time in her studio. She also enjoys playing with her spirited five-year old daughter Annabel and traveling with her partner Doug, a fine craft artist who creates titanium jewelry.