Pace Setter : June 2022

Bethlehem Central School District Holds Contest and Wins

by Andrew Rickert

Art Teacher Corey Fong, Corrinne Anderson with Award, and Coach Andrew Rickert

Most CDPHP Workforce Challenge Teams outsource their shirt designs to local screen printing companies and/or talent at graphic design firms. This was not the case for the Bethlehem Central School District team who put this task squarely in the hands of its own students.

Team Captain Andrew Rickert, who is an English teacher and coaches the boys cross country team, saw an opportunity to showcase his district’s talented Art Department. Art teacher Corey Fong teaches a course called “The Ad Agency” which is an Advanced Advertising Design class. Students were asked to come up with their best concepts and given some specific parameters the team was looking for: namely a motivational quote on the back, and to play off the narrative that the district was coming out of the pandemic. Three designs were voted on and the design chosen was junior Corrinne Anderson’s.

                      Andrew came in 44th out of 3,471 who finished

Anderson used the program Adobe Illustrator to create a design full of movement, utilizing tri-colored triangles to depict a runner in full flight. Anderson used a similar technique to mock up a possible design for the BCHS yearbook cover for the 2023 school year.

The back of the shirt reads: “It ain’t about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.”  - Rocky Balboa. The triangle theme continues with a facemask seemingly flung in the breeze.

When asked where the inspiration came for the quote on the back, Anderson cited a love for the movie Rocky. “When I knew the team wanted something to acknowledge the difficulty of the last two years, navigating the pandemic, I thought of that quote about getting knocked down and thought it fit perfectly.”

Anderson began her career in art in the 3rd grade and was inspired by her grandmother, who was an oil painter. She hopes to study Fine Arts with a minor in Graphic Design at a school such as SUNY New Paltz. Watercolor is her medium of choice.

Coach Rickert made sure Corrinne received her own size of the team shirt as well as the 3rd place trophy the race awarded in the Best Overall category. BCSD had the 2nd largest number of employees registered for this year’s race in the Educational category. Their top team was a co-ed team which finished 8th overall in the race. Rickert led the team with a 46th place finish. Their own Superintendent, Jody Monroe, placed 16th in the CEO division.  

Rickert reflected that, “Having a student design our team shirt showcases our district’s belief that education is best when the students dive in and get their hands into the process themselves. Fong’s art program is a fine example of how well our students are being trained for the next step in their careers and their lives. We most certainly will continue this tradition and are already looking forward to seeing if we can grow our team numbers next year. Hopefully the allure of the team shirt will help with that. And for this we are grateful to Anderson in helping promote our district’s wellness goal.”

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