Columbia High Student Wins National AAA Poster Award

Columbia High School student Emma Gordon, who is entering her senior year, won a national grand prize and a national first place for a poster she submitted to the AAA 66th Annual Traffic Safety Poster Program.

Gordon's poster was selected from thousands of entries in the nationwide competition. The National Grand Award was won in the senior high category for digitally Enhanced/Graphic Arts Posters and National First Place was won for creating the best poster in the senior high category.

"My family belongs to the NJ Automobile Club and I just happened to notice the 66th Annual Traffic Safety Poster Contest announcement in one of last year's issues of the AAA Traveler," said Gordon. "I had an idea for a digitally-enhanced submission and thought it would be a great way to utilize the skills I acquired while taking Ms. Malhotra's Computer Graphics course in my sophomore year at CHS."

"Emma had taken my computer graphics course in her sophomore year," said Ms. Cindy Malhotra, Columbia's computer graphics teacher. "This past year, as a junior, she approached me about the AAA poster contest and asked for my assistance and sponsorship.  I was impressed with her idea and that she wanted to commit the time during her lunch and after school to work on it."

"I am very proud of Emma." said Malhotra. "She came up with a great concept, developed a plan and showed a level of commitment that paid off." Malhotra was also so pleased that Gordon used the knowledge and skills acquired in her computer graphics course to help win the award.

"We had a lot of fun producing the poster," said Malhotra.  "It was interesting to observe as Emma problem-solved. I guided her through by asking questions that would help her find her own answers.  I was thoroughly impressed with how much technical information (Photoshop) she remembered from the previous year."

"Ms. Malhotra was extremely helpful as I was working on the poster and I am deeply grateful for her support in this endeavor," added Gordon. "I was ecstatic when I was informed that I won the Grand Award for Digitally-enhanced/Graphics Arts submissions in the Senior High Division as well as First Place in the National Group 2 Region. I intend to major in Graphic Design in college and plan to apply the monetary winnings that accompanied the awards towards my college expenses pursuing that degree."