School Spirit T-Shirt Ideas

 

School spirit T-shirts are a great way to get students involved with and excited about their school. They encourage students to be creative and to wear their school spirit on their sleeve, and they also can be used as a school fundraiser. Here are some ideas for making school spirit T-shirts have the biggest impact on the community.

 

1. Involve Student Creativity

   • Students will get more excited about T-shirts they are involved in creating. The school can hold a contest where students submit their own T-shirt designs, vote for their favorite and maybe win a prize. To open it up to more students, you could even have two contests--one for a shirt illustration and another for a slogan.
     There are other ways to get students creatively involved in their school spirit T-shirts. Though it may be easier to order shirts from an outside company, students could produce the shirts themselves, particularly as a project in clothing design class or for a screen-printing unit in art class.
     A much simpler route involves encouraging students to sign and decorate each others' shirts. It would be helpful to provide a variety of colored permanent markers, or, for shirts that will last longer, laundry markers.
     

   Keep T-Shirts Connected

   • A school spirit T-shirt will be more meaningful to the students if it is related to the school and the events going on there. A shirt could commemorate a special event, for example, such as a homecoming game or an academic competition. Students also could be encouraged to wear their shirts during certain times, such as during sporting events or perhaps one day each week.
     Although a school shirt that everyone wears can create a school-wide sense of unity, students also enjoy a sense of belonging in smaller groups. Adding a little bit of a competitive edge can make them even more spirited. If each grade has a different shirt, for example, students may try harder to create the best shirt and wear it to connect with their class and show their class spirit.
     

   Shirts as Prizes

   • Giving out shirts as prizes gets more students wearing them immediately, gets more students interested in wearing them, and gets students involved in other things. Giving shirts to the students who cheer the loudest at a pep rally will encourage a lot of the kids to be more spirited. Shirts also can be used as prizes to get students to compete in competitions or to excel academically.