scotty coppage
His second-grade teacher told his parents he needed to work on his cutting over the summer to be ready for third grade art. When he tried to draw Bart Simpson, it looked like an EKG. Being an artist was not in the cards. After nabbing a Mass Communications degree, Scotty Coppage worked political campaigns, music stores, typical mall retail jobs and bank drive thrus before teaching Speech, Debate and English for 13 years. He published “Silver Bullet Classroom Management” about teaching in 2016. He and his wife started a podcast called Mac N Cheese Movies in 2018 where they cook a dish in the film, watch the movie and talk about both. As a teacher, he fostered a love of writing or at least showed kids where to use a comma in a STAAR essay. Writing was always central but it kept drifting further and further away. After 13 years of teaching, he left the classroom to bet on his writing, his podcast, his art and himself. A coming-of-age tale at 40 years old amidst a pandemic. Scotty was in his first art show at the 9th Street Studios Memento Show in 2020 and again in 2021. He was selected as part of the Artist Development Program for the Wichita Falls Alliance For Arts and Culture in 2021. Scotty is hell bent on proving his 10-year-old self-wrong about being an artist.