Education is a lighthouse at Robert Churchwell
2 min read or 3 min watch - Learn more about tactical urbanism in action. Watch how the Design Center brought together an elementary school, artists, and community members to make a lasting impression on North Nashville’s built environment.
The Civic Design Center had been working with 3M on various projects around Nashville over the years. One project, in particular, was looking at creating corrals for micro-mobility in our Improving Accessibility blog post. In March of 2022, they kicked off their 3M School Zone Safety Program and awarded the Civic Design Center a grant to implement tactical urbanism installations to improve safety around Robert Churchwell Museum Magnet Elementary School. This location was a recommendation from Representative Harold Love Jr. who serves the State House District 58.
After having conversations with the school administration and staff, the Design Center realized there were already ongoing placemaking efforts on campus with muralist and former student at Robert Churchwell, Woke3 (Jamal Jenkins). The Design Center partnered with Woke3 and community leader, Angel Adams, to conduct a series of workshops with students to help visualize the future installation collaging traffic calming materials provided by 3M. The student collage artwork helped inspire a temporary installation that was used to launch the nationwide 3M School Zone Safety Program.
3M invited Grammy-nominated country artist, Mickey Guyton, to help bring awareness to this need for improved safety in school zones. Taking place during Distracted Drivers Awareness month, this event served as a kickoff for the 3M School Zone Safety program in the U.S. (announced by 3M). While most improvements to this school zone took place following the event, some work was completed ahead of the permanent installation (e.g., the repainting of a school zone crosswalk and an art installation to act as a visual signal to motorists and pedestrians) to demonstrate the importance of the issue and changes to come.
Following this event, Woke3 continued to work on the Lighthouse Mural that was planned for the large south-facing wall off of Dr DB Todd Jr Blvd which is now completed, and an impressive playground backdrop for students at Robert Churchwell. Robert Churchwell, the school’s namesake was the inspiration for “Education as a Lighthouse”.
A statement from muralist, Woke3:
Education is a lighthouse – guiding us towards safety, connectivity, and advancing the human quest for meaning. When we find ourselves lost at sea, it is the lighthouse in our lives that brings us peace and navigates us back home. North Nashville has always been a hub for education. Spanning over 150 years back to the establishment of The Fisk School in 1865, six months after the end of the Civil War and just two years after the Emancipation Proclamation, Jubilee Hall was erected at the crux of Jefferson Street and D.B. Todd. This monument still stands as an educational lighthouse for BIPOC students and student artists to find their way through the dark, segregated south. Hundreds of black businesses and homeowners begin casting down their buckets, as Booker T. Washington would put it, to begin making the most of the situation that they found themselves in after the war had ended. It was a new beginning.
Out of the darkness, North Nashville begins to see other institutions being built to advance the lives of people of color. Within a 5-mile span, 4 black colleges/universities were erected by 1924 including Meharry Medical College, Tennessee State A&I, and American Baptist College.
Students of all ages were looking toward education to be a pillar of hope to progress their families forward. Today we acknowledge our progress and learn from the past to better our communities in the present moment. Woke 3, a local community-engaged visual artist seeks to use public art to make people feel connected and represented in their spaces. Woke3 is a former student of Wharton Middle School, which is now Robert Churchwell. The external mural that will be created at Robert Churchwell be a lighthouse that speaks to community safety, connectivity, and the advancement of all people, in an equitable manner.
North Nashville has always been home to some of the most vibrant and creative artists this world has seen. Those same artists that we know and love were all children at some point in their lives. So we meet this moment with a spirit seeking to expand the vision and outreach to include opportunities to support young artists in their pre-professional careers.
Woke3 cuts the ribbon in front of the Lighthouse Mural
On Monday, October 24th, the whole team came together for a formal ribbon-cutting to celebrate the culmination of Woke3’s tireless efforts completing the mural in the heat of the Nashville Summer. In attendance at the event was Principal Kenneth Bonner, Representative Harold Love Jr., a 3M representative and the Civic Design Center team. Woke3 and Angel Adams gave remarks, and the ribbon was officially cut!
Later that evening, both Design Director, Eric Hoke, and Nashville Youth Design Team member, Cydney Thompson, joined Liberated Grounds’ Community Solutions Conversation at their Live at the Wall event, which was hosted in front of Woke3’s Legacy Mural, also in North Nashville. The Conversation centered around encouraging community members to be advocates as well as honing in on the focus of youth safety. At the event, volunteers built bicycles for Cand’Aid, which have been donated to Napier 1st graders! We were so grateful to be a part of such a powerful day in front of Woke3’s amazing murals.
