the Pebble Spring 2017

“convey a sense of possibility and growth” at
MPH.
“The shades of green and blue represent
possibility, opportunity (the sky’s the limit!),
energy, life and development—as in the
spring, green signifying growth,” Albetta said
in an email.
Arriving at these colors and building the
marketing campaign was a delicate process.
When Crane first pitched the green-themed
color scheme in June following months of
on-site interviews with 17 different focus
groups, the administration members were
taken aback.
“There wasn’t one single person in the
room at this presentation that didn’t fidget a
little bit when they saw those colors,” Neuner
said. “It is uncomfortable. It’s a hard thing to
grasp.”
But ultimately, these same people became
sold on the idea that change was necessary to
represent MPH as a school moving forward.
“I wouldn’t have accepted the color
change had [Crane] not been so persuasive,”
Head of School Jim Dunaway said.
Stegeman said he was aware that the new
colors would represent a break in tradition,
and as such, some people might not like it.
But he views the campaign as a necessary
departure from MPH’s recent troubles.
“I think that sometimes breaks from
tradition can be a really good thing,” he said.
“Part of what this marketing campaign was
intended to do was separate us from the
financial turmoil of two years ago, and so
if that’s what [we’re] trying to do, then that
break is a good thing.”
However, a considerable portion of the
MPH community interviewed by the Pebble
questions the school’s decision to introduce
the new logo and colors, as well as the concept
of having two sets of colors. The Pebble
interviewed 24 community members, and of
the 24, only four said they liked the addition
of the new colors. In an online Google survey
conducted by the Pebble, while 67 percent of
111 respondents (mostly students) said they
understood the reasoning behind the new
colors and logo, only 19 percent said they
supported the decision to introduce them.
Thirty percent said they supported it somewhat,
but 43 percent said they did not.
Some students, including senior Spencer
Krywy, said the new colors highlight the
disconnect between the decision makers and
the student body.
“I think they represent the new administration.
I don’t think they represent the
students,” Krywy said. “The administration is
pushing a very different angle than how we
feel.”
Annie Weiss, senior and Student Council
President, raises similar sentiments.
“It’s almost like we have two different
schools in some ways: one that we know
MPH as, and the other that we’re trying to
market MPH as,” said Weiss, who has been
at MPH since third grade. “It kind of makes
MPH less wholesome.”
Long-term implications are also on
students’ minds. Weiss said she’s concerned
by how strong MPH’s identity and sense of
community will be in the future.
“In a couple of years, I worry [the red and
white] could lose its meaning,” Weiss said.
MPH and Crane agreed that it was time
for rebranding. In 1970, when the Manlius
School and the Pebble Hill School merged,
MPH adopted the colors red (from Manlius’s
red and black colors) and white (from the
latter’s green and white). Since then, besides
a 2012 marketing campaign with the theme
“Uncommon to the Core,” the school hadn’t
updated its look or logo since the early 2000s,
when it wrapped “Manlius Pebble Hill: Think,
Imagine, Learn, Grow” around the original
Farmhouse logo.
As a result, Neuner said, the external
community viewed MPH as having an “oldschool”
and “failing” vibe; with the crisis that
almost closed the school, it was imperative to
prove to the external community that MPH
was thriving.
That one of the Pebble Hill School’s
colors was green, however, was not a source
of inspiration for Crane as it sought the best
colors to do this. The overlapping letters and
three different colors in the logo, rather, is a
nod toward the close relationship between
MPH, the Pebble Hill School and the Manlius
School.
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