Football players conceal vandals’ graffiti
Everyone experiences setbacks at some point in their lives, both big and small. Progress made can suddenly be reversed. But it is through trial and error that people really learn and persevere to come back even better. This was the case for some Trojans in March.
While students embarked on Spring Break Friday night, March 25, three CVUSD students, from both CVHS and the middle schools, graffitied the Trojan Stadium and Center for the Arts. The vandals were caught mid-act and stopped by the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department, according to ceramics teacher Jennifer Jervis.
A main target of the vandals was the 65 by 8 foot brick wall on the home side of the stadium. This defacement to campus occurred just two days after the football players assisted Jervis in painting a yellow background for an upcoming mural.
“I feel disappointed,” commented Jervis. “It’s a lot of hard work to put things together. The students involved are proud of the work that we’re doing. It’s just more work and more expense for us to have to fix it.”
On the morning of March 26, immediately after the wall was defaced, the Trojan football teams came to school to restore the murals. A layer of white was affixed to conceal the bright red graffiti. The football players were in a time crunch because a track meet was to take place that afternoon. They hoped to complete restorations before people arrived.
“Everyone who was early for the track meet saw the graffiti,” said junior Finn Chilton, who participated in painting the mural. “We take a lot of pride in our stadium and how people view us, and this made our school look bad.”
After the white paint had dried, the football players returned later in the week to camouflage the graffiti with yellow. In total, it cost around $250 to reverse all of the damage that had been done.
Although a setback in its progress happened, the stadium’s mural has been completed with ease. Instead of white patches on the wall, visitors can marvel at a logo that celebrates all the sports at our school.
“The takeaway for CVHS is there will always be individuals within and without our community who will make bad decisions that harm others, sometimes directly or indirectly,” explained Principal Blaine Torpey. “How we respond to harm is what truly defines us. CVHS didn’t throw its hands up and give up. We pursued the truth, built accountability, and came together as a community to heal the harm.”
The vandals that graffied the stadium wall on the home side of the stadium and Center for the Arts during Spring Break should be disappointed of themselves. I’m not sure what made them think that it was a good idea to do something like this. There’s always going to be someone out there who’s going to make poor choices like these. The people that did this should’ve known better and should’ve already known of the consequences that may have taken place. A huge thanks to the CVHS football team that were able to to quickly step in and stop this incident before it may have had an impact on those who would view it. They were able to repaint the violent imagery on the wall before more people came to the track and field meet that took place that day. It’s unfair that Mrs. Jervis had to pay lots of money gathering the supplies for the mural only for the it to be damaged and to pay even more for the expenses. What matters is that the CVHS team responded quickly and didn’t let the event that happened the other day affect everyone who is a member at the CVHS community. Also, a huge thanks to the Sheriff’s Department for stepping in to investigate the crime and to stop the vandals who were involved.
It’s always reassuring to see a community united to fight for something they believe in. It may be difficult, in today’s society, to remember who will stand next to you, and fight alongside you when you need them most. The football team is setting a precedent for all CVHS and Castro Valley community members to unite against a common problem. It lets me know that throughout all of the chaos that has wreaked havoc on all sports teams these past 2 years, that there is still a team and a community that connects with each other on more than just one ideal.
I think it is amazing that people managed to band together to fix the issue in a rather short amount of time (in a limited amount of time). Compared with the official bureaucracy, which usually takes very very long to fix things, this is very fast. I can think of countless places that have been vandalized but took quite long to be fixed (considering the situation). The biggest example of this is the “devious lick” incident. When soap dispensers were ripped off of nearly all bathrooms on campus, they weren’t immediately replaced. Instead, those in charge decided to shut down the bathrooms. I remember going to the bathroom only to realize that there was no soap (this was after the bathrooms were reopened). It wasn’t until much later that the soap was finally replaced. With a situation that urgent/important, I find it funny that those in charge rushed to fix this bit of vandalism but were slower than a snail when fixing the important bathroom issue.
Knowing that some of the vandals that graffitied the walls were from CVHS disappoints me since it shows that they truly don’t care about the school and how much people care about it. It disappoints me even more knowing that one of the vandals was also a middle schooler which shows that those high schoolers are being bad influences. I’m glad that our football players were able to cover it up so that our school can look nice and clean.
It is very disheartening to hear that such vandalism occurred but I’m glad to hear that the individuals who chose to participate were acknowledged and dealt with. As much as this was a negative thing to happen to our school, it is encouraging to see students come together to re-paint the wall and overall work together. I hope that this doesn’t continue to happen in the future and that the time, money, effort, and creativity put into these projects are acknowledged. There are so many hard-working people involved with activities at this school and their work should be treated with respect. At the same time, I hope this may also be another opportunity for people to understand the amount of said work it takes to maintain and improve the school in order to have this prevented from happening again.
I also find it disappointing that right after the wall was painted, people decided to graffiti the wall. Actions like this can make improving the school and it’s conditions much harder. This graffiti can make our school look bad and I like how the football players were able to conceal the graffiti on the wall. I think that there should be more people to support the restoration of certain issues in our school.
It sucks that people would do something like this and ruin a good wall. Its also bad because it costs money to fix the damaged they cost. Im glad that we have a nice logo on the wall now and hopefully it stays that way. Its interesting that the vandals were caught in the act. Maybe they will learn their lesson and not do it again.
The vandals that graffied the stadium wall on the home side of the stadium and Center for the Arts during Spring Break should be disappointed of themselves. I’m not sure what made them think that it was a good idea to do something like this. There’s always going to be someone out there who’s going to make poor choices like these. The people that did this should’ve known better and should’ve already known of the consequences that may have taken place. A huge thanks to the CVHS football team that were able to to quickly step in and stop this incident before it may have had an impact on those who would view it. They were able to repaint the violent imagery on the wall before more people came to the track and field meet that took place that day. It’s unfair that Mrs. Jervis had to pay lots of money gathering the supplies for the mural only for the it to be damaged and to pay even more for the expenses. What matters is that the CVHS team responded quickly and didn’t let the event that happened the other day affect everyone who is a member at the CVHS community. Also, a huge thanks to the Sheriff’s Department for stepping in to investigate the crime and to stop the vandals who were involved.
I applaud all the football players that are getting rid of the graffiti. It is sad to think anyone would graffiti the high school. Especially when they do huge graffiti signs in the stadium. I agree with Finn Chilton that not only does the graffiti make the school look unprofessional but it is very disrespectful.
People should value their education and the opportunity they have currently. So often we take as Americans the things that are so common to us for granted. That we are so fortunate and because we are born in it, we tend to take it for less value. Many countries don’t have the resources to supply every kid with a k-12 year education like America. I am glad for the football team stepping up in a role of leadership and authority over the situation. They were able to stand up and not allow this behavior to withstand. Or most likely they were forced to do so by their coaches, but it beats running laps for football practice.
I think it is great that so many people were willing to help fix the wall. Like Mr. Torpey said, there will always be people that make bad decisions and impact others. But the most important thing is how you respond to those situations. You don’t just give up and feel sorry for yourself. You scale that obstacle and keep moving. Finn demonstrates that true Trojan pride. My hat goes off to him.
I feel like the vandals are very disrespectful and should be punished. They messed up the super beautiful mural that was painted on the wall. I was at baseball practice and I could see the vandal marks leaving. It is disgusting what people can do sometimes.
I think it was a good act on the football players side for stepping up and covering the graffiti. Graffiti can make a school look bad and by covering it up the football players makes the school feel like a safer place.
I think it is highly disappointing that this happened to our school. Everyone works so hard to make this a nice place and a few bad people are all it takes to destroy it. I live by CVHS and the same night this occurred the whole entire side of my dad’s work truck was graffitied. We believe it was the same people who graffitied the stadium who did that to my dad’s truck. It is already disappointing that they had ruined a part of our school but that they also had done it to somebody else’s property. I hope that they are held accountable and as a community, we come together to stop things like this.
It’s interesting to hear that middle school students graffitied our high school. I’m not glad that it was defaced, but I’m kind of grateful because otherwise the mural wouldn’t have been done. The school hasn’t been repainted for a while now, so it resembles a low-maintenance recycling-center. If there are any opportunities to further beautify the school, I’m sure a lot of people would be up for it. Costs to the district can be lowered if a call for art supply donations is made.
I do not agree with the previous comment that states the perpetrators should be fined $2.5-15k… That amount of money could buy a used car and they are like 12 lol
Vandalism is something so easily committed but very hard to repair. i think that it was a great idea on behalf of the football team to go out there and clear up the damage even though they were not the ones who caused it. The school should be proud to have such a strong community of students that is willing to help out when something is not right.
I´m glad that we have such a kind, and caring football team that tasks the time to do things like this will no hope of recognition. I think that the people who graffitied the school should be ashamed of what they did. I hope that they find who did this and have them pay a fine for damages and the cost of repair. Things like this shouldn´t be happing on school grounds or at all. I find it hard to believe some people are like this.
I think what they did was good, even if they did not volunteer for the work. Really dumb of the people that vandalized the mural. Especially since they got caught immediately. Plus it wasn’t a funny prank how i’m sure they thought it would be, it was just straight up a crime and unnecessary.
It is great to see people get together and fix a disgusting act. I believe the students responsible should be fined or suspended from cvhs and whatever middle school they go to
i think it’s really unfortunate what happened to the wall. even though that occurred, the football players as well as ms. jervis pushed it off and painted over it. there was still a common goal and i can’t wait to see the upcoming mural.
The students who chose to vandalise our school should be ashamed of their actions and should face the proper consequences. I think its admirable that the football team immediately helped to cover up the vandalism. I think their actions set a good example for the rest of us at CVHS. I also wonder what made those students decide to vandalize the stadium.
I think that these people who concealed the graffiti have done something that any good citizen should do. They are helping our school out, as we all should do, and I think that more people should do the same. I am going to consider suggesting to my scout troop that we do something to help undo the harm caused by that stupid trend that we heard about earlier where people vandalized bathrooms.
I think that these vandals who did this should be fined thousands of dollars (I would fine them $2,500 to $15,000) for their actions, depending on what they wrote, and how much it costs to pay the owner of the property to fix it.