In loving memory of the soldiers who have given their lives during the Iraq war, Mr. Licier and Ms. Comoglio’s art students helped to make a memorial commemorating what those soldiers fought and died for.

Mr. Licier and Ms. Comoglio came up with an idea to do a memorial for war victims to help students gain an appreciation for the world around them and the people who were affected. Students from their classes participated by painting portraits of war victims and then put them all together to make one large memorial.

“I’m proud of my students because their actual paintings became more on an advanced level and they showed they cared about what they were painting,” said Ms. Comoglio.

The process of gaining this appreciation was first presented by Ms. Comoglio using a power point presentation. Next, students researched memorials all over the world to learn more about them.

Mr. Bokeno spoke to her classes because he was in the first Gulf War. He told the students about his experiences to help explain the importance of creating memorials for people who died.

Afterwards, students went to a website from the Washington Post and researched their assigned soldier or affected person. They also got pictures from the website which they used to create their portraits.

The amount of lives explored started around the mid 50'sand then towards the end of the project, there were approximately 64 people researched. Mr. Licier and Ms. Comoglio got as many paintings as they could, but not everyone could do their portraits for the memorial. In the end, there were jsut over 40 paintings completed. From the beginning to the end, the project took about 2 ½ - 3 months.

The paintings were displayed in a ring around the central part of the media center. The community became involved a great deal and an APG speaker, some parents, and many teachers came to the presentation on April 26.

“Everyone is showing some support for it,” Ms. Comoglio said.

The students’ feelings were touched by this memorial by seeing how sad the victims’ families seemed to be after they studied and wrote about their lives.

Junior Jackie Cast, an involved student artist, said “It’s good to show we care and it makes our actual portraits more meaningful.” Cast’s portrait won first place for paintings in the wet media section in the 2007 Edgewood High School Art Show that was held Thursday, May 3rd.