Coppell High School digital art teacher Brennan Frugé has been an artist his entire life, yet never truly considered teaching until he turned 30 years old.

Frugé began his computer graphics career in 2000 as a 3D graphic artist for BOKA Powell in the DFW area.

In 2011, Frugé began embracing an overall passion in art education. While working full-time and starting a family, he obtained his degree in art education from the University of North Texas. Taking his passions to Perkins & Will as a visualization artist, Frugé worked on various architectural projects, while making appealing 3D visualization, until the end of 2017.

“I believe instruction in the visual arts is beneficial for young students to have a way to portray themselves,” Frugé said. “When I got laid off in 2009, prior to working at UT Southwestern, I decided to do some soul searching and prayed, which eventually led me to realize that I should focus on following my passion through working in the field of art education.”

To obtain more practical experience with students and to stay close to his family in Coppell, Frugé began engraving a path at Coppell ISD by completing two rotations as a clinical student teacher. At Coppell Middle School East, he worked under Jillian Richards for seven weeks and with Lakeside Elementary School’s Cacey Narez for another seven weeks. Frugé finished his training as a student teacher in 2018, leading him to becoming an art teacher to fifth and sixth grade students at Sloan Creek Intermediate School, in Lovejoy ISD.

“[Frugé] has been a great addition to our art education team as he has a lot of knowledge from previously teaching middle school and now is doing great with transitioning into high school,” CHS Art I and II teacher Sarah Williams said. “We all have a solid relationship with him and definitely have expanded our students’ knowledge when it comes to digital art.”

Frugé loves to learn, even things not correlated to art, and enjoys keeping his brain’s creative gears occupied.

With his wife and two young kids living in Coppell since 2014, Frugé enjoys working on home-remodeling projects, such as building a rock-climbing wall for his kids and working on a fixer-upper house. When he’s not teaching, Frugé loves to camp with his family, make soap, home brew, and especially believes ceramics is his favorite 3D art endeavor.

“[Frugé] is great at pushing students outside of their comfort zone which is very significant for the students to maximize their full potential through their artwork,” CHS Art I and II teacher Michelle Hauske said. “The best part about his teaching style is that he doesn’t just lecture the students, but makes sure he does his best to engage with them, while also challenging them.”

Since it had never occurred to him to become a teacher in high school, Frugé mainly focused on computer graphics, pushing him to have a completely different career for 14 years prior coming to CHS, including work with digital photography, video production, graphic design and more.

“I want to teach in a way where my students feel comfortable with me to put out their best work through their art,” Frugé said. “Teaching gives me the chance to instruct other young students in ways they can be comfortable.”

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