Ilayda Altuntas, Ph.D.

Dr. Ilayda Altuntas earned her Ph.D. in Art Education from Pennsylvania State University. Her dissertation was titled "Pedagogy of Sounding: Tuning in Art Education" The dissertation involved the creation of a course called "Sound art & Installation at Pratt Institute's Center for Art, Design, and Community Engagement K-12 in collaboration with the director Daniel Bergman.

She is an emerging scholar, artist, and educator whose research focuses on sound pedagogy, sounding art practices and methods, and listening theories with awareness and memory. Her teaching specializations include curriculum design, sensory-based teaching methodologies, teacher licensure in art education, and community-based art education. Her research has been published in journals such as NAEA News; the International Review of Qualitative Research (IRQR), and International Journal of Arts-based Educational Research (iJABER) reflecting her commitment to advancing the discourse on sound in art education.

In her dissertation, she explored the intersections of sound, identity, and social contexts in creative practices, leading to the development of the Sounding Art Practice as Research (SAPAR) methodology.

Ilayda's recent projects include the Art & Soundscapes: Collective Senses course, where students are encouraged to explore cultural, social, and environmental sounds to create unique soundscapes and related visual artworks.

In addition to her academic work, Ilayda is actively involved in the art education community, serving as Chair-Elect for the Seminar for Research in Art Education (NAEA), as the Higher Education Division CAA Representative and as an Editorial Board Member for Visual Arts Research (VAR). Before her time in higher education, she worked in NYC's Public School System; and taught Art History and Visual Art classes (in the South Bronx, Harlem, and Manhattan districts). She also worked at Pratt Institute's Saturday Art School for five years; supervised the Saturday Art School at IU Bloomington and Saturday Art Program at Penn State. She has experience with edTPA NY licensure processes; her students' work was displayed in the P.S. Art 2016 exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Manhattan Borough's Art Festival 2016, and MoMA in April 2017.

She received her M.S. in Art and Design Education from Pratt Institute (Brooklyn, NY) and wrote her master's thesis on the experiences of art facilitators in NYC's detention centers, with a focus on the work of The Drama Club NYC, a non-profit organization that brings improvisational theater and performative experiences to NYC's incarcerated youth. She also served on the New York State Juvenile Justice Coalition board for a year. In addition, she holds a double-major B.F.A. with high honors in Plastic Arts (Painting, Sculpture & Ceramic) and Fashion & Textile Design from Yeditepe University, Istanbul.