The completion of a mural project is always a cause for celebration, and our mural dedication ceremonies have proven to be a fantastic way to gather as a community, recognize the youth artists involved, and culminate the project.

Dedications are especially important for our school mural projects because of how many benefits they offer to the school community as a whole. For many students, it is their first opportunity to practice public speaking, sharing their experience in front of their peers. Dedications also provide an opportunity for parents/teachers to attend and feel pride in their children’s/student’s work.

We recently held a dedication ceremony at Lincoln Elementary in partnership with YMCA Expanded Learning Programs in Escondido, and afterwards, principal Jason Hoff shared his thoughts with us: “Seeing two of my students publicly share their story in front of an audience was amazing. Many of our students are shy/introverted, and it’s truly a unique experience to see each other ‘taking the lead’ during these celebrations.”

One of the student speakers he was referring to, Nylie, shared some of her experience painting the mural during her speech, “The importance of working on this mural is that it brought us together to do something new and fun for our school. Before this mural we would walk by it and it would be empty. Now, we get to see something that represents us!”

Seeing the impact that our murals have in their respective communities is what drives our mural team. Dedication ceremonies offer us a chance to connect with those communities, celebrate everyone’s hard work, and close out projects in an exciting way.

We hope you enjoyed this insight into the world of murals! Your continued support is vital to the success of these projects, and we look forward to celebrating many more murals with you in the future.

Thank you for being a part of this vibrant community!