The winning Deerfield Day T-shirt design (above) was voted on by the student body.
When Choate and Deerfield face off tomorrow, for the annual Deerfield Day, the competition will not be limited to athletics. Deerfield Day is always an opportunity for the students to showcase their school spirit. One way that Choate students do this is through wearing Deerfield Day T-shirts. The overall winner of the 2017 Deerfield Day T-shirt Design Contest was Tagan Farrell ’20, who worked with fellow classmate Devin Seli ’20 in creating a blue shirt design that features the Wild Boars logo and records of previous Deerfield Days.
For about the last 15 years, students have submitted T-shirt designs a few weeks before Deerfield Day for the whole student body to wear as it cheers on its school.. This year, 21 different ideas were submitted to the Director of Student Activities, Mr. James Yanelli, by students of all ages. The submitted designs varied in colors and messages but also had plenty of similarities. Most of the designs were white, and almost all of them were long-sleeved. Many also featured either the traditional Wild Boars athletic logo or the fairly new front-facing boar, as seen on some team items this year.
According to Mr. Yanelli, each design went through a filter, and any containing copyrighted materials, such as the Deerfield logo, were removed from the competition after the first round. The “Deerfield Uses Single Ply” t-shirt, which included a Deerfield logo, was an obvious example of a well-liked t-shirt design that was not acceptable due to copyright limitations. For future Deerfield Day T-shirt design contests, Mr. Yanelli plans to send out a clear list of rules and limitations pertaining to what can and cannot be on the T-shirts. This will lower the amount of shirts that Mr. Yanelli would be forced to veto.
Last year, the decisions on which design would be made available for students to order was selected by the Student Council. This year, however, the entire student body had the ability to affect the outcome of the competition through a vote. The designs with the top five votes from the first round were put forth for a final vote. Despite having the chance to vote on designs, many students were disappointed by the selection of shirts that made it to the second round. Carter George ’20 and Parker Jones ’20 both felt that the selection was “a bit of a let-down.” According to Matt Anastasio ’19, “They are not fun.”
However, not every student was unsatisfied by the contest’s results. Isabelle So ’20 liked how the designs “bring out Choate’s spirit.” This year’s Deerfield Day T-shirt Design Contest was an inspiring combination of Choate school spirit and the unrivaled artistic abilities of Choate students.
