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A small school wins a big competition
NORTH JACKSON
“Arrive Alive, Don’t Text and Drive” reads the Ohio Department of Transportation’s District 4 winning plow.
This year’s Paint-A-Plow competition had 12 entries with representative schools from six District 4 counties: Ashtabula, Mahoning, Portage, Summit, Stark and Trumbull.
Jackson-Milton High School students took the annual event and used it as a public service announcement about a topic relevant to their age group – and won first place, said high-school art teacher Katelyn Amendolara.
“It was pretty open-ended and we kind of turned it into a PSA and incorporated it with the roads for ODOT – and not texting and driving is really important to stress, especially among high- school students,” she said.
Amendolara said she enjoyed seeing a diverse group of students – in ninth through 12th grade – work together on one big project.
“I’m really proud of them because it’s a small school and you’re working with a lot of different [students’] skills. So the students are finding success with working together and projecting their idea on a larger surface, as well as working as a team which is so important,” she said. “They just got along so well.”
Sophomore MacKenzie Grope said working with a big group benefited the outcome of the plow.
“Everyone has a unique perspective and you can get perspective you might not have thought about,” she said. “You equal each other out.”
Marina Karch, a sophomore, said the project was not only interesting due to working with different perspectives, but also because they were working with such a “unique medium.”
Sophomore Tim Adam agreed. The sheer size of the project was his favorite part – a 12-by-5-foot plow.
Amendolara said not only was the experience good for students to show their art skills, but also because it was community-based.
“Each year now we are focusing on doing something in the community and getting them out in the community,” she said. “For being a small school I was excited we could get this accomplished. ... Plus they get to see [the ODOT truck] out driving around with something they created on the plow.”