JACKSON TWP — Some students often feel like no one else could possibly feel the same way they do, but the students at Seneca Valley Intermediate High School found out they have more in common with each other than they realized.

About 1,200 students were asked to fill in the blank “I am ...” in an exercise to bring the student body together. They were asked to write their response on a colored card to be hung on a wall in the stairwell called the “I Am Wall”

Some students responses were: happy, athletic, finding my own way, unique, loved, beautiful, one of a kind, striving for greatness and not afraid.

This project was suggested by Ken Macek, a technology education teacher.

Macek said he was interested in unifying the student body through activities that begin at the start of the year.

He saw a video of a similar activity done at another school.

“I clicked on the video and watched it, and I found the video to be so inspirational that I was like, ‘I gotta make this happen,’ Macek said. “I did not think it was going to be on a whole school scale. I thought it was going to be in my classroom.”

His idea ended up going to Courtney Williams, CARE adviser and ninth-grade biology teacher, and she decided to do the project as a CARE activity. CARE is the bullying prevention program and stands for “Create A Respectful Environment.”

Williams said one of the purposes of the care program is to have students connect with one another even if they are different. The video was shared with the students on the first day of school, and they were told they were going to do something similar.

“I thought this was a great way to start the year because we have so many students, and it is really hard to come up with an activity that would unify all of us,” Williams said. “We can do it at a classroom level, but to do it at a building level, it was a great way to do it.”

Macek said the students were honest while writing down the responses.

“They did not take it as a joke. It was what they were feeling at that time,” Macek said, adding that seeing the entire wall built as one brick showed the diversity at the school.

Williams said her favorite aspect of the wall is that it lets students know that someone else was feeling the same way they were at the time.

“Even if they are too shy to say it themselves, they can see that they are not alone. I love that part of it,” Williams said.

She said while they were putting up the wall, students would make comments like they feel that way too or they loved a certain response.

“I could see it before we even finished, it already is serving its purpose to connect students to show them how they are similar even though they are all different,” Williams said.

Macek said at this age the way a student feels changes on a daily basis.

“So one day someone could say I am Superman because you are feeling on top of the world that day,” he said. “Then the next day if you are having a bad day, you can say, ‘Hey look, someone else had a bad day.’ It shows you are allowed to have feelings.”

Jack Reynolds, a sophomore, made a video about the wall project.

Williams said, “He volunteered himself, and he went above and beyond making the video.”

Jack said the wall is cool: “I definitely think it was a great way to represent the student body and try to pull us all together.”

He said the video was made to get the wall out to the community to see what the students are doing because people don’t come to the school and walk though the stairwell all the time.

Williams said the other building officials in the district have seen the video and want to do a similar project.

This is something that Williams and Macek want to continue to do every other year.

“We will leave it up and replace it every two years,” Williams said.

To view Jack’s video, visit www.svsd.net/IAmWall.