Senior Sweatshirts: A Debate
The senior sweatshirt has been a long standing tradition in most high schools. Grace is no different. In January, Dean Rufer emailed the whole grade, introducing the senior sweatshirts. Anyone could submit a design, and he explained that the top two or three designs would be presented to the grade for a vote. However, only one design was submitted, so there was no need for a vote.
In late April, the sweatshirts were finally revealed and available to Seniors. 
The sweatshirt is medium grey, with the navy wording “Grace Seniors” with an “18” in the middle. On the back, it said, “Third times a charm.” Under that, was everyone’s name in the class of 2018. The issue is that the wording was incorrect.
On the first day we got the sweatshirts, there was uproar over the error. Some people were angry, as they noticed that saying “Third times a charm” was not correct, in terms of both phrasing and grammar. There was a printing error during production. It should have read, “The third time’s the charm.”
Seniors complained, and the school listened. They school paid the cost to reprint the sweatshirts with the correct wording, “the third time is the charm.”
Senior Gigi Diserio told the Gazette, “At first I was really surprised and annoyed but then I found out it wasn’t our schools fault, so it’s fine. I’m glad they ordered us new ones.” Even though we finally got the sweatshirts with the correct wording, there was still some seniors expressing their frustration over the way the sweatshirts came out. I talked to some seniors to hear their thoughts on what they really think of the sweatshirts.
Preston Wilson ‘18
“The senior sweatshirts are a welcome tradition to this year’s senior class of Grace Church School. Being the third grade ever to graduate, it has been important for the class of 2018 to continue to grow these types of traditions in order to build the foundation for a tight-knit school community for centuries to come.
With that being said, the process of designing the sweatshirts this year felt like an afterthought. The simple design was pleasant, but the initial order of sweatshirts had quite a few grammatical mistakes which do not represent the rigorous academic environment of Grace. Firstly, the line atop the back of the sweatshirt read “THIRD TIMES A CHARM,” leaving out the apostrophe before the “S” in “TIMES,” as well as misrepresenting the original saying “Third time’s the charm,” with “a” instead of “the.” Lastly, the names of the seniors were sorted alphabetically by first name, where it is tradition to sort the names by the first letter of the last name of each student. The school then recognized these mistakes, deciding to order a whole new batch of sweatshirts. This time, while much better than the first iteration, they stated “THE THIRD TIME IS THE CHARM,” a wordy, also incorrect misrepresentation of the traditional saying. It is natural for a new school to expect growing pains of the sort, but cutting corners on grammar and authenticity on the important tradition of senior sweatshirts is not an accurate representation of Grace Church School.”
Camilla Choa ‘18
“I wish we got them in the beginning of the year. I think it would have made me feel closer to the grade if we were wearing our sweatshirts throughout the whole senior year.”
Julia Sebastia-Lopez ‘18
“I think they’re fine they’re just a little basic. They look like every other Grace sweatshirt I’ve ever gotten but at least they got the accent on my name right.”
Ben Usher ‘18
“Sexy but they don’t know the proper saying.”
Andres Perez ‘18
“To be honest I am not a huge fan of the senior sweaters this year. I feel like we could have comes up with something better and have nicer colors. I am also sad by how late we got them.”
Penelope Hinds ‘18
“I really love our senior sweatshirts because we initially messed them up, which I think really encapsulates our grade.”
Ava Dupont ‘18
“They are kind of plain and lacking school spirit.”
Camille Segre-Lawrence ‘18
“I love the senior sweatshirts because they were designed by our fellow classmates, adding a little bit more meaning to them.”
Millie Novak ‘18
“Waiting for the ‘grammatically correct’ sweatshirts were annoying, but overall I like them!”