Schuylkill Haven Area Middle School students bring positive art to hallways
Jun. 21—SCHUYLKILL HAVEN — After a year's delay, Schuylkill Haven Area Middle School art students have given the school hallways doses of positivity through bright colored paint and inspirational quotes.
Amanda Seanor, middle and high school art teacher, said on the last day of the school year, June 9, a group of seventh and eighth graders completed a mural with the words "Make good decisions for a better tomorrow" painted over a rainbow background.
"We wanted to bring positivity into the building," Seanor said. "After it rains, when you see a rainbow, it makes everybody smile."
The mural covers a 73-foot long, 7-foot tall wall inside the middle school, with "Make good decisions" written at one end and "for a better tomorrow" at the other end. Seanor said students enter and exit the hallway from both sides, so she wanted the message to make sense from either direction.
"You can read it both ways," Seanor said. " 'Make good decisions for a better tomorrow,' or 'For a better tomorrow, make good decisions.' "
Seanor said the idea to paint the hallways came up during the 2019-20 school year.
The Schuylkill Haven Sherwin Williams paint store donated the materials. Seanor said she reached out to the store in early 2020 and wrote a project proposal asking if they would be willing to donate paint, primer and brushes.
"The supplies arrived March 12 and, March 13, we shut down," she said.
Seanor said she and the students, Kaitlyn Russo, Bella Murphy, Arianna Yule, Riley Cillo and Abigail Zulick, finally got to work in October and finished by the end of the school year.
"Every Friday after school, we would stay until 4 to work on it for months," Seanor said. "I wasn't sure if students would want to stay late and work on something like this, but I never had a Friday that they weren't here."
Along with the students, Seanor said other teachers joined in, sometimes asking if they could paint to relieve stress.
Seanor said she also heard other students complimenting the project as they walked by and saw the work in progress.
"It was a buzz that was happy and positive," Seanor said.
Principal Matthew Buletza expressed amazement at how Seanor turned the quote, which he had used a few years ago as the school's yearly mantra, into a meaningful work of art.
"Whichever way you're going, it will still speak to you," he said.
"Adding color to our hallways will engage students' minds so they're ready to learn," Buletza said.
The students have painted smaller pieces throughout the hallway with quotes they chose themselves. Seanor said their assignment was to select a positive quote and illustrate it with imagery.
Some of those quotes include, "Light up the world with kindness, love, peace, joy and truth," "We learn from failure, not from success," and "I'm still learning."
"It was interesting to see which kid chose what quote, and why they chose it," Seanor said.
Other student projects are posted on the @schuylkillhavenart Instagram account to share their work with parents and other students.
"It makes it fun," Seanor said. "It's nice to watch the interactions there."
Seanor said they may do more projects throughout the building, such as painting positive messages on bathroom stalls.
Buletza said the mural project sparked an interest among students and teachers, so he would love to see more.
"We have a building that's been here for a while," he said. "We want to put our mark on it and leave it better than we found it."
