Angelique Mcintosh is Cal High’s new photo 1 and advanced photo teacher, replacing longtime teacher Paul Fortayon, who ran the film photo program for 24 years before leaving last year.
Mcintosh decided to become a teacher because she likes being creative and felt like teaching photography would allow her to do that.
Mcintosh has been teaching for nine years, but this is her first year teaching high school students. Previously, she taught art in Portland, Ore., before teaching fourth grade at Golden View Elementary.
She attended the University of Oregon, where she decided to get her single subject teaching credential for art and earned her master’s degree. She also minored in photography.
When the opportunity to work at Cal presented itself, Mcintosh took it. She had heard positive stories about the school and the San Ramon Valley Unified School District’s education system from her previous Golden View students and other teachers in the district. Her mom also taught in the district, so she had heard great stories while growing up as well.
“It’s been really fun,” Mcintosh said. “I love it here. I think it’s a great school, and I’m so happy I made the move.”
In her classes, students shoot, develop, and make prints from their film. Currently, students are learning about composition art principles and how to make and display proper prints.
Junior Declan Jones said the class is also learning a lot about the history of photography and how actual film itself works, which is different from last year when Fortayon left at the semester and the class and was taught by Jennifer Sampson.
Junior Abigail Frassinetti said advanced students were taking photos with bigger film paper while the beginners were using smaller pieces.
“We’re just learning,” Frassinetti said. “We’re going over the basic parts of a camera and how to develop film.”
Frassinetti said beginning students are getting used to and familiarizing themselves to using film.
“We exposed film paper for five seconds, and I made a picture on the film,” sophomore Kalen Young said. “So it was really cool.”
Mcintosh said photography has been challenging because people are used to taking photos on their phones and seeing instant results.
“It doesn’t come within 30 seconds or even a second with your phone,” Mcintosh said. “I think that sometimes can be a challenge for some students because they may want that instant gratification, or they anticipated something would come out, and then it doesn’t.”
Some students had expressed concerns about having a new photo teacher because so many of them thought finding a replacement for Fortayon was going to be tough. Despite these challenges, students provided a lot of positive feedback about Mcintosh and the way she runs the class.
“I think she’s nice, and I think she’s doing a good job of making changes with the way she likes things being ran,” senior Nickya Bullard said. “We have a combined class of advanced and photo 1, and I think she’s doing a good job of breaking things down.”
Photography is important to Mcintosh because it captures memories and documents history. Jones said that many students take the class to complete their art credits, but it offers other benefits as well.
“I think anything that can be made into a career is very helpful, even if you don’t want to make it into a career,” Jones said. “I think it’s still something that could be good to know in life.”
Jones advises students looking to go into photography to start with film first.
“With digital, everything is automatic and you can just kind of click and take a picture, whereas with film, there’s a lot more thought that you have to put into it, and you really have to pay attention,” Jones said.
Mcintosh advises students thinking about taking the class to go for it.
“I think the biggest way you learn is by trying,” Mcintosh said. “It’s so satisfying when you finally get that perfect print that you’re happy about because you’ve worked so hard.”
