Seniors Work on Senior Sign
Katherine Louise Guevara in front of the senior sign that she designed.
As part of Kempsville tradition, one of the ways that the students leave their mark on Kempsville is through the creation of a senior class sign that hangs on the outside of the building.
The senior sign is a large mural painted by the Senior Class Council. The purpose of the sign is to reflect Chief spirit and a message from the Seniors that they feel represents them as a class. Once revealed, the sign is hung on the exterior of the auditorium to be seen by all in front of the school. This year, the design for the sign was drawn by Katherine Louise Guevara.
The Senior Class Council has been working diligently on the sign under the guidance of Senior Class Council Sponsor and World History teacher Meredith Malbone. With her help, the Senior Class Committee has spent months going through a lengthy process to achieve the final design and painting.
To start this process, an idea for the sign is pitched and if the idea works, an artist is then to draw the design.
“It starts with brainstorming a slogan,” Malbone said. Also needed – as an important aspect of the sign – she said that the design “usually incorporates a Chief in some way, shape, or form.”
Half of the class of 2020’s senior sign completed. After months of preparation and designing, the senior sign was completely painted and finished, waiting to displayed on the front of the school.
From that point, it is then discussed how the design will be depicted; finally, it is drawn by the artist. After a design has been created, plywood, paint, chalk, and other supplies are purchased to start tracing it onto plywood. Once traced, the design is painted and prepared to be introduced to the senior class.
While in the past this process has taken 2-3 weeks, the senior sign this year has taken around two months to finish. This is due to multiple reasons, one of which being the amount of time it took to prepare for homecoming. Despite this, seniors have worked so that there was only a one-week delay in presentation, as the sign was unveiled on November 8, during halftime of the senior night football game instead of at the pep rally a week earlier.
Homecoming preparations and a small work crew delayed the production of the senior sign. Along with the lack of volunteers, another problem they encountered was that not much work could be done over the summer, as Malbone switched classrooms and students had summer jobs.
Apart from this, the sign was completed in a timely manner.
Mylynn Hopper is a senior here at Kempsville High School. She is also a member of the Spanish Honor Society. She enjoys creative writing and photography.
