O’Connor, a senior, was encouraged to engage in the opportunity by Chassell Superintendent Steve Spahn.

“I heard it was kind of a thing that was going on through Chassell, but Mr. Spahn actually told me that it was going to happen,” she said. “He recommended me for it, and I did it.”

O’Connor has taken a few art classes in her time at Chassell, but her skill and designs are from the heart.

“I’m kind of self-taught, but I have joined the art class occasionally,” she said.

Photo courtesy of Keith Meyers The new Chassell Township logo designed by Chassell senior Aili O’Connor.

She has not done any projects for the Copper Country Community Arts Center, but the idea interests her.

For O’Connor, her design for the Chassell logo was inspired by her own experiences.

“I was thinking of what Chassell means to me, and what is important, so, a lot of recreational activities and nature altogether,” she said. “The Strawberry Festival is a huge part of the community’s involvement. I kind of tried to piece all that together.”

The design process took some time as well as some back and forth with the township.

“It took me, I would say, maybe with the edits, maybe five hours,” O’Connor said. “We had to spread it out over about two weeks for basic trial and error and finding a shared image.”

Photo courtesy of Keith Meyers The Chassell “Bark Park” sign named by students, put up by Michael Randell’s Building Trades class.

O’Connor shared that this was not her first foray into local art competitions.

“I’ve kind of been freelancing a little bit. I’ve done the VFW art contest as well, and I got fourth place in the state for that,” she said. “That was through the art class.

“Every year they’ve been in that competition, So they would send like two or three drawings to the VFW around here. And then the county, I believe. The district will choose one drawing, and then it’ll get sent to the state.”

O’Connor had very practical advice for young local artists looking to improve their skills and style.

“If you want to improve your art, I would say just keep practicing,” she said. “Look at what you might find faults with in your artwork, and then try to find tips on how to improve that. Then the better you can get, I would say the more opportunities that they have. Social media is great for sharing their artwork, too.”

Keith Meyers, vice-chair of the Chassell Township Planning Commission, spoke about the contest and working with O’Connor.

“We had a contest that the Planning Commission put on to seek out a new design for a logo,” Meyers said. “She was the winning contestant from the school and she really did a nice job. She really captured the essence of the image we wanted captured.”

The planning commission’s goal was to have as much public design and input as possible with the new logo.

“That was the exciting thing about this. It’s been a characteristic of what we’ve done with a lot of stuff with our planning commission. We really like getting public input on things, whether it’s the design for the new playground we’re going to put in, or going all the way back to when we sought input for our five-year rec plan. It’s important, getting public input on important things, and I think it’s great with something like this, where we can get kids involved in terms of their own community and contributing in this fashion. It’s a really cool element.”

The township has already begun using O’Connor’s logo design.

“We use it when we’re submitting grant proposals,” said Meyers. “We’re watermarking documents with the design, and we’re putting it out in front of the community and putting it on our website.

“I think it’s really cool that we get the students involved and it shows we’ve got some great talent right here. It’s one thing to have a logo professionally designed, but it’s such a nice touch to be able to say that it was created by someone in our own community.”

The planning commission has worked closely with Chassell schools before, including Michael Randell’s Building Trades class.

Randell’s class has built signage for the township including the new dog park sign which was also named by students through a public contest. Other projects included doing extensive work with the Chassell trails, such as replacing a bridge.

The newest project for the township and Chassell’s Building Trades class is removing and then replacing playground equipment, which is scheduled for June.

“I think that’s a really cool element in this community is people’s willingness to participate. When we built the bridge, we had other volunteers with us. Between the class and the volunteers, we had over 280 hours on the bridge and the trail,” Meyers said. “People step up because they want this to be a great place to live, work, and play and that’s what we’re trying to make.”

After the latest batch of projects, the planning commission and Chassell schools plan to continue their work relationship.

“We’re gonna continue to find ways to engage them wherever and whenever we can,” he said.. “This is something at the end of the day that might help them make their career choices and decisions or whether it ends up being a career form, or whether it ends up just being a great hobby. It’s just amazing. These are very important life skills that they’re gaining in this process.”