Adam Huening
Greensburg Daily News
Greensburg —
At its most basic level, a school provides students with an education. Above that, it has a duty to isolate and develop a student's natural talents.
With all that schools give, when a student gives back using the talent honed under its teachers' tutelage, it often is a special moment.
Over the summer, a 2010 Greensburg grad used her artistic talents to leave her mark on the schools within the Greensburg Corporation. Sarah Herbert recently completed a mural beneath the staircase at the junior high, a feat that has impressed many in and around the school.
Herbert, a scholarship winner pursuing arts in college, has already lent her talent to a mural at the high school depicting the 2010 class. This time, she transformed the empty space beneath the stairs with the flare of Michelangelo.
The space was once a tiny rock garden, but really it merely collected dust. The eyesore frustrated administrators and exhausted janitors.
The school's new principal, David Strouse, looked at the barren space and envisioned an opportunity to enhance school spirit. Herbert brought it to life.
According to Superintendent Tom Hunter, Herbert took painstaking measures to freehand the impressive oceanic scene, complete with pirate, instead of using a projector to trace a smaller drawing. Herbert spent hours crouched beneath the stairs hand brushing every stroke, like Michelangelo stretched out on his back to paint the Sistine Chapel.
The result was awe-inspiring, administrators, staff and students agree and added a new angle to school spirit.
While it is a nice addition to the school, especially after a successful renovation the year prior, Hunter said the system takes more pride in the student and her accomplishments.
"She's a very talented student. I know she's going to do really well, hopefully in art, which she really enjoys," Hunter said. "It's great to see a kid have success in something they enjoy."
