{"id":8475,"date":"2023-11-08T21:59:59","date_gmt":"2023-11-08T21:59:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/?p=8475"},"modified":"2023-11-08T21:59:59","modified_gmt":"2023-11-08T21:59:59","slug":"vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/","title":{"rendered":"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-8476 lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image-200x133.jpg\" alt=\"Rachel Aponte\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image-200x133.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image-400x267.jpg 400w, https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg 600w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 300px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 300\/200;\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-8476\" src=\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image-200x133.jpg\" alt=\"Rachel Aponte\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image-200x133.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image-400x267.jpg 400w, https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/noscript>Summit, NJ (November 8, 2023)<\/strong>\u2014The Visual Arts Center of New Jersey (VACNJ) is proud to announce the hiring of Rachel Aponte as its new Director of Education and Community Engagement, effective immediately. Aponte will join VACNJ after serving as the Education Program Manager at the Center for Contemporary Art (CCA), in Bedminster, New Jersey. “We are truly excited to have Rachel Aponte join our team,\u201d said VACNJ Executive Director Melanie Cohn. \u201cHer extensive experience in arts education, combined with her commitment to inclusivity and her leadership in the arts community, makes her the ideal choice to lead our Education and Community Engagement initiatives. Rachel’s vision aligns perfectly with our mission to inspire and engage our community through the transformative power of art.”<\/p>\n<p>Prior to her role at CCA, Aponte served as the Senior Visitor Assistant at Grounds for Sculpture, in Hamilton Township, NJ. She serves on several state-wide committees, most notably as a co-leader of ArtPrides’ DEAI Advisory Committee. She received her Master of Arts in Museum Professions from Seton Hall University and her BA in Arts in History from the University of Central Florida. \u201cI am incredibly excited to be a part of the Art Center team,\u201d said Aponte. \u201cI am passionate about arts education and making it accessible to all people within our community and it is clear to me that the Art Center works tirelessly towards the same goal. I feel lucky to now be a part of their team.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Summit, NJ (November 8, 2023)\u2014The Visual Arts Center of New Jersey (VACNJ) is proud to announce the hiring of Rachel Aponte as its new Director of Education and Community Engagement, effective immediately. Aponte will join VACNJ after serving as the Education Program Manager at the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":8476,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"0","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-press-release-2023"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement - Visual Arts Center of New Jersey<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement - Visual Arts Center of New Jersey\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Summit, NJ (November 8, 2023)\u2014The Visual Arts Center of New Jersey (VACNJ) is proud to announce the hiring of Rachel Aponte as its new Director of Education and Community Engagement, effective immediately. Aponte will join VACNJ after serving as the Education Program Manager at the\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Visual Arts Center of New Jersey\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"400\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Brian Riley\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Brian Riley\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Brian Riley\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/person\/c46644efab148f1478be03c554a6e85e\"},\"headline\":\"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/\"},\"wordCount\":253,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Press Release 2023\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/\",\"name\":\"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement - Visual Arts Center of New Jersey\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg\",\"width\":600,\"height\":400,\"caption\":\"Rachel Aponte\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/\",\"name\":\"Visual Arts Center of New Jersey\",\"description\":\"\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Visual Arts Center of New Jersey\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/VACNJ-Logo-WEB-1.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/VACNJ-Logo-WEB-1.png\",\"width\":1600,\"height\":870,\"caption\":\"Visual Arts Center of New Jersey\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/person\/c46644efab148f1478be03c554a6e85e\",\"name\":\"Brian Riley\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f00b06c96d44e488db9443dd8011abde?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f00b06c96d44e488db9443dd8011abde?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Brian Riley\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/author\/briley\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement - Visual Arts Center of New Jersey","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement - Visual Arts Center of New Jersey","og_description":"Summit, NJ (November 8, 2023)\u2014The Visual Arts Center of New Jersey (VACNJ) is proud to announce the hiring of Rachel Aponte as its new Director of Education and Community Engagement, effective immediately. Aponte will join VACNJ after serving as the Education Program Manager at the","og_url":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/","og_site_name":"Visual Arts Center of New Jersey","article_published_time":"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00","og_image":[{"width":600,"height":400,"url":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Brian Riley","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Brian Riley","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/"},"author":{"name":"Brian Riley","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/person\/c46644efab148f1478be03c554a6e85e"},"headline":"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement","datePublished":"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00","dateModified":"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/"},"wordCount":253,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg","articleSection":["Press Release 2023"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/","url":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/","name":"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement - Visual Arts Center of New Jersey","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg","datePublished":"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00","dateModified":"2023-11-08T21:59:59+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/RA-Headshot-Press-Image.jpg","width":600,"height":400,"caption":"Rachel Aponte"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/vacnj-hires-rachel-aponte-as-new-director-of-education-community-engagement\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"VACNJ Hires Rachel Aponte as New Director of Education & Community Engagement"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/","name":"Visual Arts Center of New Jersey","description":"","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#organization","name":"Visual Arts Center of New Jersey","url":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/VACNJ-Logo-WEB-1.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/VACNJ-Logo-WEB-1.png","width":1600,"height":870,"caption":"Visual Arts Center of New Jersey"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/person\/c46644efab148f1478be03c554a6e85e","name":"Brian Riley","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f00b06c96d44e488db9443dd8011abde?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f00b06c96d44e488db9443dd8011abde?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Brian Riley"},"url":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/author\/briley\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8475","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8475"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8475\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8478,"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8475\/revisions\/8478"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artcenternj.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}