By: Liz Farmer

Five billboards created by students at Patapsco High School and Center for the Arts for the “Create, Don’t Hate” project will be on display throughout Baltimore from now through the end of the month.

The project is part of the national Design Ignites Change campaign. Last fall a group of 31 students at Patapsco High worked with members of the Baltimore Chapter of AIGA, an association of graphic designers and artists, to create slogans and logos to encourage citizens to stop crime, prevent violence, care for the community, and develop tolerance.

Here are the five designs and students selected as finalists:

“Tolerance, Imagine That” by Bernadette Szrom – Calvert Street (west side), 10 feet south of E. Federal Street.

“Tone Up the Tolerance” by Jeremy Jirsa, Ginger Corbett, and Chance Moody – Curtis Avenue (east side), 10 feet north of E. Patapsco Avenue.

“Makeup Doesn’t Make Me” by Sarah Henry, Erika Shaddock, and Samantha Panuska – Dundalk Avenue (west side), 380 feet south of Gusryan Street.

“Don’t Trash Baltimore” by Emily Baum and Amy Louden – Eastern Avenue (north side), 80 feet east of S. Bethel Street.

“Welcome to Diversity Baltimore” by Ryan Pachilis and Jessica Searfino – E. Federal Street (north side), 920 feet west of Erdman Avenue.

Not only does a project like this give students a chance to see their work at work in the real world, it means a little more to the viewer of the ad knowing it came from a younger generation that wants to change the world they’re growing up in.

It’s too bad something like this couldn’t run year-round. Billboards are prime real estate in the advertising world but certainly bust stops or other outdoor advertising substitutes could be donated without much adverse affect on budgets.