News

White Station teen is already making magic

Tachele Anderson joined over 100 other youth from around the country who were part of the 2011 Disney Dreamers Academy with Steve Harvey and ESSENCE Magazine. by Rhonda Gillespie
Real Times News Service

After drawing an apple on one side of a small, round card, Tachele Anderson sketched a tree on the other side. Then she twirled strings attached to the card to create animation and an illusion that apple’s stem was coming out of the tree’s trunk. Anderson marveled at the simple animation she created during a workshop at Walt Disney World.

Tachele Anderson, a junior at White Station High School, traveled to Walt Disney World knowing how to draw a tree and returned with the skill to make it move. (Photo credit is Real Times News Service/Rhonda Gillespie.)

Anderson joined over 100 other youth from around the country who were part of the 2011 Disney Dreamers Academy with Steve Harvey and ESSENCE Magazine. They all spent four days at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla. learning that they can dream, and dream big.

The White Station High School 11th grader has had a passion for freehand drawing since the eighth grade when she started drawing Japanese cartoons she’d seen online. Her sketches reveal a natural talent for the art.
She discovered the special mentoring and career enrichment program last year but applied too late. This year, she made certain her application was in by the deadline.

It paid off for the 16-year-old who listened intently to the animation lessons taught by experts in their field and had a chance to interact and have lunch with two of the Walt Disney Studios’ standout animators, Marlon West and Bruce Smith.

Smith, who created the Disney series “The Proud Family,” was part of the animation team that developed The Princess and the Frog villain, Dr. Facilier and West was part of the team that did the movie’s special effects. West also did effects animation for “The Lion King.”

Never forgetting to say “yes ma’m” after any question, Anderson said she loves to draw but her true dream is to become an obstetrician/gynecologist after she graduates high school.

Anderson, who is taking an anatomy class in high school, has her sights set on the University of Chicago and a career that will allow her to make dreams come true for many young families.

(Rhonda Gillespie reports for the Chicago Defender.)