Reviewed By Conrad BenzContent Manager & Hiring Manager
Ida Pettersson
Career Coach and Resume Expert
Committed to empowering job seekers of all experience levels to take the next step in their careers, Ida helps professionals navigate the job hunt from start to finish. After graduating...
Do you want to teach at a school that cares deeply about the arts? Use our art teacher cover letter example and follow our expert writing tips, and you'll have all you need to share your passion with youngsters in no time.
Hiring Manager’s Name 341 Company Address Palo Alto, CA, 94301 (xxx)xxx-xxxx hiring.manager@gmail.com
Dear [Hiring Manager’s Name]
I noticed you’re looking for a [Position Title] on [Website Name], and I’m sure I’m an exact fit for the role. Visual art is my life, and nothing fulfills me more than motivating the next generation of creatives by sharing my passion with young learners in K-8 classrooms.
My love for teaching art is backed by formal training across various creative mediums and incredible classroom results. I have extensive experience developing interactive art curricula that synchronize art history and various traditional and digital disciplines — photography, videography, graphic design, drawing, painting, and printmaking, to name a few — and I adapt my lesson plans to accommodate the diverse needs of different learning styles.
Here are some key achievements from my 8+ years of teaching art:
At Tuscaloosa Middle School Magnet, my current job, I’ve reached 100% of my curriculum targets each year
My students won multiple awards from the County Art Show, an extracurricular contest I encouraged them to enter
Under my instruction, 93% of my 80+ K-8 students at Minor High School passed a cognitive drawing rubric with 2 years of growth
I believe it’s my job to foster relationships with my students so I can integrate their interests with my lesson plans. My goal is to inspire students to apply the information and techniques they learn in my class to sharing their unique life perspectives.
After researching your organization, I’m confident that my vision for an ideal middle school art class environment aligns perfectly with yours. I’m eagerly anticipating the chance to discuss how I’d realize that vision in your open [Position Title] position. Please contact me at (123) 456-7890 or youremail@mail.com at your earliest convenience.
Sincerely,
Your Name
Average art teacher salaries in the US
The following table includes information from O*NET Resource Center by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license, this data is pulled from the most recent US Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Employment & Earnings report (as of 10/16/2024), featuring the top states by use.
Top 10 states by average art teacher salary
State
Salary / Year
New York
$144,520
California
$126,870
New Jersey
$122,340
Maine
$112,140
Maryland
$111,940
Connecticut
$110,060
District of Columbia
$107,910
Hawaii
$106,510
Rhode Island
$105,010
Vermont
$104,970
National Average
$102,240
Art teacher cover letter writing tips
Finding an art teaching job that offers the freedom and resources to develop creative lesson plans isn’t easy. So when you do, it’s important to make a strong impression on employers. A surefire way to stand out from other applicants is by writing a cover letter shows school hiring boards why you’d be a perfect fit for the job.
Check out our video guide below for to learn the basics of creating an excellent teacher cover letter, no matter what subject or age range you teach:
To build on the advice outlined in our video, follow these three tips to turn your art teacher cover letter into a masterpiece:
1. Highlight your passion for teaching art
To land your dream K-12 art teaching job, you must prove your passion for your work. School hiring managers search for enthusiastic educators who can engage easily bored youngsters.
Use your cover letter to show you’re the type of person who can get students excited about art. For inspiration, consider this excerpt from the above cover letter sample that demonstrates the ability to motivate students:
My students won multiple awards from the County Art Show, an extracurricular contest I encouraged them to enter
If you’re an aspiring art teacher writing a cover letter with no experience to draw from, explain the passion for sharing art that guides your teaching philosophy:
I believe it’s my job to foster relationships with my students so I can integrate their interests with my lesson plans. My goal is to inspire students to apply the information and techniques they learn in my class to sharing their unique life perspectives.
2. Focus on your art teaching skills
Your cover letter must emphasize the skills that make you a great art teacher. Hiring managers and applicant tracking software (ATS) weed out applications without relevant hard skills and soft skills.
Get your application through the review process by including common skills associated with teaching art in your cover letter. Here are some options:
Reference skillsets mentioned in other teacher cover letters and tailor them specifically to arts education — bonus points if you differentiate between traditional and digital art education experience.
3. List key achievements from your art teaching career
Art is subjective, but your cover letter still needs to feature hard numbers that illustrate objective success. The person reviewing your application is likely concerned more with pass/fail rates than the freedom of expression you encourage in the classroom.
So, if you passed students at an exemplary rate, include that number on your art teacher cover letter. Here are some more ideas for incorporating hard numbers into your cover letter:
The number of your students who went on to study art in college
Amount (in dollars) of art scholarships awarded to your students
Data from student art shows
The number of art awards your students have received
Committed to empowering job seekers of all experience levels to take the next step in their careers, Ida helps professionals navigate the job hunt from start to finish. After graduating from New College of Florida with a B.A. in Philosophy and Chinese Language and Culture, Ida moved to Hong Kong to begin her own career journey and finally settled in Taiwan. Her insights on resume writing, interview strategies, and career development have been featured on websites such as LawCareers.net, Digital Marketer, and SheCanCode.
We hope our free downloadable resources will help you on your path to career success. If you have time, a quick review would really make our day (it'll only take 15 seconds). Best of luck on the job hunt!