The Reflections Program allows our students to express themselves through their gifts & talents in the ARTS!!  Each year Maryland students participate in Reflections and produce amazing entries in all six Reflections arts areas.  We are so pleased you have chosen to run this program in your PTA/PTSA and wish your students the best of inspiration and dedication in producing this year’s winning entries.  Any questions can be emailed to the Free State PTA Reflections Chair at reflections@fspta.org.

 

This year’s theme is “Accepting Imperfection" 

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To begin, go to https://www.pta.org/home/programs/reflections and click on the center of the Reflections home page on “Register Today”.  After registering your PTA, look at the information provided through National PTA.  Please note that the National PTA information is general information, but none of the documents are customized for the Free State PTA Reflections program.  All information on the Free State PTA Reflections Program is available at the following link: https://www.fspta.org/reflections.

 

The 2024–2025 PTA Reflections Arts Program has a new theme, "Accepting Imperfection", which is intended to inspire students to express their creativity while embracing their unique perspectives. The program also has some new rules, including:

Accessible Arts

Moving forward, the Special Artist division will be referred to as the Accessible Arts division. This change is in response to concern around the term “special" based on feedback gathered from participants, volunteers and partner non-profit organizations and recognizes the importance of evolving how we talk about disability to align with and be more inclusive of people with disabilities.

The division-specific guidelines and student entry forms include updated language and the new title. However, the competition process and structure of the division was not changed.

Stay tuned! This enhancement is part of larger, forthcoming updates to the division that will debut in the future.

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Other Updates

Materials were updated to provide consistent and clearer guidance around the use of technology and copyright materials in entries:

Use of Copyright Materials: Guidelines were clarified to explain that, while permitted in certain categories, copyrighted material in an entry must be incidental and/or is a smaller element of a whole and used to create a completely new and different work of art.

Use of Technology: Guidelines were clarified to emphasize that digital technology may not provide the primary design and/or concept for an entry and to indicate that entrants must provide a brief description how they used the technology/software, including any generative elements (e.g., algorithmic techniques, artificial intelligence).

The category-specific guidelines and student entry packet/form reflect these changes. In addition, the category-specific guidelines also reflect language adjustments, especially the following:

Visual Arts: Category-specific guidelines now specify "digital art and graphics (drawings/paintings/ illustration)," rather than "computer-generated images."

Literature: Category-specific guidelines now specify dictation is permissible based on the student
being able, rather than their age.

Special note for Free State PTA entrants:

Submissions may not be created using artificial intelligence software (such as ChatGPT, DALL-E rotor, hotpot AI, deep AI, Craiyon, nightcafe, or other text-to-art software tools) to generate any part of the content or composition. Content generation, including composition and arrangement, must be the result of student exercise of skills and tools. This does not preclude the use of image painting and editing software such as photoshop, gimp, paint or similar software tools for any entries.

Students can participate in the following divisions: primary (pre-K–grade 2), intermediate (grades 3–5), middle school (grades 6–8), high school (grades 9–12), or accessible arts (all grades) through the PTA associated with their school.

The FSPTA 2024-2025 Reflections Handbook and appendices provide the information local leaders need to implement the Reflections program in Maryland. Please share this information with your community and others interested in learning more about the Reflections Program. Local Chairs--please also be in touch with your Council PTA chair and share contact information
as soon as you can.​

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Click to view and download all supporting 2024-2025 program documents located below for additional information.