New logo design brings new athletic wear

If you paid any attention to the new planners, you might have noticed a change in branding. Last school year, Poolesville High School received a notice from Purdue University with claims that our school logos were too similar, and therefore requested that we change it. Perhaps thinking that the logo was due for a change anyways, Regina Grubb, the school’s athletic director, started working with Deena Levine, the principal at the time, to create a new one.

“We just decided just to go ahead and try to figure out something we could do that’s very similar, but had a little change to it,” Grubb said. “So then what I did, is that I started doing research on my own and working with some vendors, some designers, to come up with, what I found to look similar, but give us our distinction of Poolesville.”

However, changing the logo meant that other aspects of school representation had to be changed, too. Namely, the new gym floor and athletic uniforms. While it may seem as though changing the gym floor would be an inconvenient new project to be completed over the summer, as it turns out, the logo change actually worked in the school’s favor. 

“It actually came at the right time. We had been talking about getting our floor redone for a while, we had been trying to work with MCPS to get it done, and then finally we were on the list,” commented Grubb, who also talked about plans to make the logo much larger and more prominent on the new gym floor. 

As for new uniforms, according to Grubb, the uniforms are regularly switched out every few years with fresher, newer designs and pieces anyways. So those teams that still have the old P, if they are not using a different type of design altogether, will slowly have their uniforms phased out in the next few years. There are even some teams that do not use the P at all. The basketball and soccer teams, for example, usually use the flying falcon icon holding the ball from their sport on their uniforms and merchandise.

In terms of student opinion, there has been a mixed response. Ashlynn Stearns, a senior on the cross country team, remarks: “I don’t like how the falcon’s covering the P.” Furthermore, this new logo also meant that they had to get new singlets and jackets for this year. 

Ashley Pacheco, a senior on the cheerleading squad, says “I think it’s nice that you can see the mascot with the school logo.” And while the squad also got new uniforms this year, it was simply their time for a new look, as neither the old nor new logo is part of the design either way.