Some Vans shoes could soon get Central High School an extra $50,000.
Art students at Central made it into the top-50 schools in a national competition. The Vans High School Custom Culture competition is meant to inspire high school students to embrace their creativity, while also bringing attention to increasingly small arts education budgets. Students use blank Vans shoes and customize them around specific themes, hometown pride and the “VanD(IY)orean Legacy.”
Students submit their designs along with an impact statement, explaining how the grand prize could change their school. People across the U.S. then vote on the best designs.
“We are a close-knit community with broader horizons that include downtown Knoxville, the Tennessee River and the Great Smoky Mountains,” the school said in its statement. “Central is the oldest public high school in Knox County with “pride and tradition” as our motto.”
The statement goes on to explain that Central High School is among the most diverse public high schools in Knox County, with the district’s largest English Language Learner population. They said pandemic-related challenges have severely hit the community, and “threaten to dampen our pride and make achievement seem out of reach.”
The winner of the competition will get $50,000, while the four runner-ups will get $15,000 in prize money. People can vote online through Friday.
Click here to see the shoes and the story on WBIR-TV.
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