Pine View Elementary Art Room Makeover Revealed

Chants filled the air—"P-V-E-S!"—as students armed with brightly colored pom-poms filled the cafeteria at Pine View Elementary Thursday. They had asked the same question many times during the past few weeks, and it was time to hear the answer.

“I want you all to ask one more time,” art teacher Jill Hallauer said.

“Is the art room finished?” the students said in unison.

It was HGTV celebrity designer Robert Novogratz who gave the answer.

“The art room is finished!” 

The $25,000 celebrity makeover of the Pine View Elementary art room was sponsored by Bounty, a Procter & Gamble Company.

Bounty wiped away the old classroom and gave us a new one, Pasco County school board chairwoman Joanne Hurley said during the pep rally.

A random drawing allowed 20 students to accompany Hallauer from the assembly to see the classroom’s transformation firsthand. The remaining students watched the reveal live via video stream.

Once the ribbon was cut, the wait was over— but the excitement wasn’t. The once-bland room now bursting with whimsy and color was met with squeals, oohs, and ahhs.

“Elated is a good word,” Hallauer said when asked how she was feeling. She had not been allowed into the room once the renovations got under way.

And Hallauer had no idea that Bounty also had stocked the room with two Macbook Pros, three iPads, six digital cameras and a new kiln. She discovered those surprises as she toured the room. 

Hallauer’s excitement matched the students', who sat coloring and chatting as their teacher checked out the room.

Second-grader Kajai Kelly, 8, wrote a simple sentence across his orange paper: “This is the coolest school I have ever been to.”

“I’m pretty excited,” fifth-grader Colby Jones, 11, said. “I think art can really express people.”

Colby hopes to be a professional soccer player or a video game designer when he grows up, and said art is important for learning how to design things.

“I’m pretty creative, I might also be a house designer,” Colby said.

“If all else fails,” he added.

“Phenomenal is the best word I can use. We’re very privileged,” said Kristy Leary, a parent whose two children who attend Pine View. 

Pine View was chosen to receive the art room makeover by luck of the draw—teachers were asked to submit their wish lists on teacherwishlist.com, a new school-family website that aims to help alleviate teachers’ out-of-pocket spending on school supplies. Schools that registered five or more teachers on the site through Sept. 27, 2011, were entered to win the grand prize makeover.

The school had seven teachers register on the site, and their involvement did not go unrecognized. Those teachers were presented with a signed copy of the Novogratzes’ book, “Downtown Chic,”  $50 from Bounty to use toward items on their class wish lists, and portraits painted by students.