Can art promote positive change in the world? Students from Assistant Professor IlaSahai Prouty’s Art for Social Change course were on a mission to find out when they invited RJM to Appalachian State University, Boone, North Carolina in 2012. We asked their strong metal program in the art department to team up with us. Margaret Yaukey, professor and metal area head, along with Angela Bubash, faculty in metal, both accepted the challenge.

This installment added a new layer of collaboration to the project that RJM had never tried: to invite makers who had previously never made jewelry before. Students from the metal program were partnered with these students, and together they made an impressive body of work. Jody Servon, Associate Professor and Director of the university’s Smith Gallery, asked participants to design and create a series of pop up galleries across campus. This widened the reach of RJM at Appalachian State University, as more students saw the final work, learned about the mission of the project, and, in some cases, claimed a piece of Madeover jewelry for their own.