Bartlesville Radio: The area’s best source for news, weather and sports!

Students at Bartlesville High School have been painting murals on a hallway wall leading into the new cafeteria area in the school. Rojan Patel is one of the students painting a mural. He is painting a mural of Steve Jobs. Other students that commented on their murals are Mariah Snyder, Kelsey Graves and Honesty. Snyder is painting a mural of Woody Guthrie, Graves is painting a mural of Maria Tallchief and Honesty is painting a mural of Martin Luther King. Below the students are pictured with their murals.

The students would go on to say why they selected the murals they wanted to paint on the wall. Patel says he chose Steve Jobs because of his huge impact on technology today. Snyder chose Woody Guthrie because she grew up listening to Guthrie's music and Graves chose Tallchief because she is a dancer. Honesty would say that she chose Martin Luther King because of civil rights and how they impact her family today.

The four students that talked about their murals mentioned that they have loved painting the murals and the legacy they will leave behind with them. For Honesty, she has a younger sibling that will attend BHS and she hopes her mural will inspire her younger sibling.

Principal LaDonna Chancellor expands on this and says they decided to do the murals to inspire all students.Curiosity is another reason why Chancellor and the BHS art teacher Rhonda Williams wanted to do this project for their students. They wanted to give their students something they could relate to. That included finding a health representation of all cultures and genres of famous people.

The idea to paint the murals stemmed also from a Twitter post Chancellor saw. The post showed what a school in Virginia did with a blank wall and inspiration. She said she wanted to do the same for her students and talked extensively with Williams about the idea in December. Now the students have nearly completed the 2-month long project. All that remains is a description for each mural and what that famous person did with their life. The students will work on those as well.

Rajon Patel                            

Honesty

Kelsey Graves                        

Mariah Snyder