Starting a School Club

[Johnno]

Hi folks,
The art club at the high school that I work in has asked me to help them out.
I know very little about art (this art looks good, this art looks bad  ) but a little more about painting miniatures.
I have pitched the idea of leading several workshops on painting miniatures.

I have several questions and hope the collective can help...

1) Lesson Plans - I plan on running 6-8 lessons based on an introduction, assembly/basing/priming, how to paint: fur; bone; skin; cloth; and metal.
Each student will receive 1 miniature per lesson relating to the lesson. So fur = humanoid animal, bone = skeleton, skin = berserker, cloth = mage and metal = knight.
For the fur lesson, I will teach (d'uh) how to paint fur but the students won't paint any metal bone or cloth until those workshops. At the end there will be 1-2 free workshops where the students can finish their incomplete miniatures.
Are there any other areas I should devote an entire workshop to? ie. wood, gemstones etc?
Does this layout make sense or is there a better way?

2)Funding - always an issue! The art club has access to paints and brushes so minimal costs will go here.
I require 1 miniature per lesson (fur; bone; skin; cloth; and metal) TOTAL 5. There will be 10 students plus me and possibly another teacher. 5x12=60 miniatures.
I've grown up assembling GW plastics and they have miniatures that fit each category. But they are so expensive. I've been considering Reaper Bones as an alternative.
Any other miniature companies I should consider?
Anyone ever use any company for school related purposes and get hooked up?

Anything else I'm missing, should be aware of etc?

[CptJake]

I would ask local game stores and gamers if they had any figures they were willing to donate for the club.     Some of the online game stores may even be willing to donate if you approach them.

I know I donated all my 15mm WW2 stuff to a teacher buddy who was starting a FoW club for students at his school.   

Good luck, I hope the kids enjoy it and that maybe one or two actually take up the hobby!

[jon_1066]

How long is each lesson?  The obvious thing to do is reduce the number of miniatures - there is no real reason nearly all those finishes can't be found on one or two minis.  You will also want to be able to paint more than one thing at a time else half your lesson will be spent watching paint dry.

What about making scenery?  Foam core and coffee stirrers all round!

The final lesson could be a game of Song of Blades and Heroes with your finished minis and scenery.

[Johnno]

The club will take place at lunch hour.

Students will have to eat lunch, set up, paint and tidy up in 1 hour.

Good idea about asking local gamers/businesses.

Scenery is an interesting lesson. Maybe something small to turn finished works into small dioramas...

I contacted Reaper and they have helped me get started....
GW did not.

[fastolfrus]

GW won't even give you a discount.
Mantic are generally very helpful this side of the pond.

I run a school club that has been going for years (I've been running it for a decade or so now).
We theme topics by term, so autumn term we play "Empire of the Dead" (fits in with Halloween and it's an easy game system). After Christmas we start on other things (chosen by the club members) but starting with basic terrain making.

We use foamcore (from some conference signs we are re-cycling) card and coffee stirrers.
This term we are working on half-timbered housing, but previous years we have built Spanish housing, Old West / frontier buildings, and last year it was pirate ships (so we now have 14 pirate brigs or sloops in 28mm, plus a merchantman and a frigate). We have roughly an hour per session after school.
From experience, you may be surprised at how fast they paint stuff. How old are your students?
Ours vary, but most are 11-14, and are not generally very skilled at art or modelmaking when they first join, but they rapidly improve.

Our oldest boy at present, built a 28mm Whitehouse for an 1814 game a couple of years ago.

[Johnno]

Hey Fastolfrus,
My students are 14-17 years. They are arts students so have some level of painting skill.

I might do some terrain making as Fastolfrus and Jon_1066 have suggested.

Bit disappointed by GW' s response to be honest.

I don't know if I'd have enough response for a gaming club so I figured a painting club MAY help garner some interest. Time will tell.

The figures will be fantasy based so open the possibility to play SoBH or some dungeon crawler....maybe on student made dungeons...

Thanks for the well wishes CptJake! I now have a few more businesses to harass ask.

[has.been]

Don't forget basing, Peter Guilder used to say, 'As long as the top of the hat & basing was O.K. you can get away with quite a lot', and didn't half paint a lot.
Put a local appeal out. Lots of children who bought GW have grown up, gone to University/moved away. Parents are often happy to give the stuff away. If there are lots of broken bits use them for the lesson on 'Conversion/repair'

Buy a bag of cheap knights/soldiers (Your equivalent to our Pound-Land) fot the starter lessons. The figures are larger (40 to 54mm) which is better for learners, and cheaper (20 models for £1) so students less worried about ruining an expensive model. If knights/Vikings then use finished models in a skirmish game. Move on to 28mm later if you want.

 If the models are WW2 or later do not worry, you do not have to stick to accurate colours (though the myriad of splinter cammo designs used would give lots of options)  The Grant family came up with imaginary Napoleonic countries, your students could come up with the modern equivalent, Not just their own country, but regiments each with its own back story (get the English department involved in the creative writing).

Most of all have fun!  My art degree took all of the fun out, as a result it was several years before I did art again.

[Johnno]

Basing, check!

The high school is in a lower income "at risk" area. I'll put out some feelers regarding unwanted miniatures but I 'm dubious that anyone will respond.

There is a charity I have worked with that provides money to fund sports, arts and music programs. They currently fund a ball hockey program I oversee, and have done so for many years.

Painting larger plastic toy soldiers might be a good way to proceed if the funding doesn't come through.

[Belgian]

Em4 sells 50 plastic orcs/ dwarfs for around £7.00. Not the best miniatures but cheap could maybe be worth contacting Mantic Games or Warlord Games. Avatars of War also has plastic fantasy miniatures.

[fastolfrus]

Mantic were very helpful to us and gave us quite a selection of free bits & bobs.

Warlord are friendly enough and offered us a club discount.

But you're on the other side of the pond, so postage may be a bit more.
Worth a try though.

Osprey may come up with something, even if it's only posters/catalogues (their posters are really good though, big artwork taken from books, but poster sized, quite handy for subverting the art department, and may inspire your art students - if they are really good illustrators they could earn some cash.)

[Johnno]

Thanks for the tips Fastolfrus!
I will email each on Monday when I'm back to work. Work emails seem much more official. 
I might also try out a local store...maybe give a discount in exchange for free advertising/good will.

[Johnno]

Update!
I've also reached out to a charity that funds programs (arts, music sports etc) for at risk youth.
Luckily (??) My school is in an at risk area. So they may kick over some funding. We shall see. Still waiting on responses from Mantic, The Army Painter and my local store.
Wish us luck!
I also discussed making terrain with the students and they were pumped! I found a ton of foam core I had cut down into walls for houses so lots of possibilities there.

[has.been]

With the foam core, peal off the thin card from one side. You can then impress on to it with a Biro (or similar tool) to get:-
Random stone (drawn freehand); Brickwork (with the aid of a ruler); Wndows/Doors in fact whatever you want.
If you do a 'net' (pattern to build say a building) you only need to photocopy it on to paper, glue it to the foam card, then cut it out. Design several alternative 'fronts/sides/backs' & a whole town of different buildings is easily possible.
I pin the bits together until the wood/PVA glue has fully dried then pull the pins out with pliers, but careful use (& removal) of masking-tape will also do.
Sci-Fi terrain is also fun, re-cycling: Ink cartridges; plastic carton lids; insides of broken electrical goods, in fact just about anything. My wife's broken vacuum cleaner became a Victorian Steam-punk flying warship for 28mm games.
The only limit is your (& their) imagination.

[Annie]

I'm only a "little guy", but if any of my own figures are useful to you, just pop me a message (on here or http://thedicebaglady.net/contact ) I don't always sponsor things (I get asked a lot, and as a one person company, you just can't do it all) but I'd love to help with this, anything to get more younger people in the hobby, it sounds like a great project.

Depending on when you're running the project as well, I may have more variety to chose from - lots of releases in the next few months. If my figures aren't what you need (which is cool, I know your needs are quite specific) but you still need some more, let me know exactly what sort you're lacking and I can point some of my other wargames manufacturer friends your way.

Cheers
Annie
The Dice Bag Lady
Bad Squiddo Games

link to my figures - http://thedicebaglady.net/bad-squiddo-games-miniatures/

[Johnno]

Thanks Annie,
So far I have 11 female students (eek!)
Still waiting for funding so I think we'll start with terrain using supplies on hand..