Transitioning into high school can be a intimidating experience for incoming freshmen or new students. However, the senior class of 2022 found a way to help make the change easier. 

   In the spring of 2022, the National Art Honor Society (NAHS) President, Julianna Gutierrez, and sponsor, Rebecca Massie, were approached by the Senior Class Council, asking for their help to paint a mural on the stairs for the senior gift.

   “It’s been a while since there had been a senior gift.” Gutierrez said. “I’d like to think that since we lost so much time due to the pandemic, we were trying even harder to leave something behind.”

   The senior gift is often a bench given to the school as a parting gift. In the past few years, the senior classes weren’t able to participate in this tradition due to COVID-19. So finding something that was going to make up for the years past was going to make planning their gift harder. Laura Watkins, the Senior Class Council sponsor, was all in for the new idea of helping the seniors achieve their goal of leaving behind their mark on the school. 

   “The seniors wanted to leave a lasting legacy,” Watkins said. “They thought the benches from the previous seniors were nice, but the seniors of 2022 were ready to do something different.”

   The thought for the mural was thanks to Jack Weddle, one of the Senior Class Council members. His thought: seniors leave behind advice on the wall that people could see and read everyday, and this would be placed where almost every student could pass it, the second floor main stairwell. 

   “Now anytime an underclassmen passes the mural they can read words of advice left by the class of 2022,” Watkins said. 

    The Class Council met with NAHS to develop the theme and background for the advice mural before they chose the final idea: a jungle scene with a tree full of advice. 

   The NAHS asked all of its members to submit a drawing using the theme and then selected one of the submitted drawings. Olivia Thompson’s sketch was chosen to be the base of the design, depicting a lion sitting on a branch and his cub sitting on a rock under the large tree. With the final sketch decided, the seniors of NAHS started work on the mural. They brainstormed ways to include advice without writing on the wall. 

   “We worked on several ideas how to make the leaves where seniors would write their advice,” Massie said. “We finally used vinyl paper and sharpies for the leaves.”

   With the mural finished, it was time to collect the advice from the seniors. Once they were able to collect the advice, the only thing left was to write the advice on the leaves and adhere them to the mural. All advice collected was quoted so the seniors could be recognized and heard.

   “Don’t forget to have fun sometimes,” Adrian Patterson said.