They are all around school, advertising the Instagram account @gumondesks.

Oral communications teacher Carloyn Evans-Stone’s first nine weeks third block class completed the project. The entire class participated in the campaign; each student assigned to a different group.

“[The students] had been complaining about gum under the new desk, and I was looking for an argumentative speech assignment idea,” Evans-Stone said.  “It seemed like a good idea, so I pitched it to the kids.  They bought into the idea immediately and ran with it.”

Evans-Stone helped to organize the students into groups to complete different parts of the campaign such as print ads, video ads, music, promotions and speech writing.

The students came up with concepts, plans and production for the assignment, but before they could launch their campaign, they had to clear it with Principal Jay Pickering.

Sophomore Hayden McFarlin spoke on behalf of the class to Pickering, assistant principal Rachel Rasburry and librarian Rebecca Downey.

“It was nerve-racking, but they took it well,” McFarlin said. “Mr. Pickering was smiling through parts of the speech because we added some humor. He okayed it without hesitation.”

McFarlin said the project started as just a speech and became a full-fledge ad campaign.

“We wanted to do something that would benefit the whole school,” McFarlin said.

Sophomore Baylie McLaren was one of the students helping with the ad campaign and teacher surveys.

“In one teacher’s class, there was 33 pieces [of gum] and we have only been here for one nine weeks,” McLaren said.

On the last day of the first nine weeks, the campaign group hung posters in all the Building 10 bathrooms and in random places around campus.

“Another student that did a ton of work on the project was the secretary, recorder, speech organizer and Instagram page developer Audra,” Evans-Stone’s said.

Sophomore Audra McAnally took photos of classmates throwing away gum and uploaded them to Instagram under the account @gumondesks to help promote proper gum disposal.

“I put it all together,” McAnally said. “We just take pictures and it’s for people to look. Basically, don’t ruin the new school and keep it clean.”

The “gum on desks” campaign and Instragram account is still very much active even though the nine weeks is over, and posters will remain up across school to help remind student to keep the school clean.