Students at RancheView School in Sunset Ridge marked the end of Pride Month by painting a Progress flag crosswalk in front of the school.

The Progress flag continues the Pride flag six-stripe rainbow by adding a chevron of white, pink, light blue, brown, and black. The addition symbolizes transgender rights, people of colour, and those living with or lost to HIV/AIDS.

Principle Sharon Cronin explains how a group of students came together to make this project a reality.

“Our GSA club is made up of about 25 grade five to eight leaders in the building. We've been meeting for the year, via zoom, because we've got students in nine different classes. We kept the kids cohorted and every Thursday at lunchtime there's an adult leader that's been with them and they just talk about really whatever they want to talk about. They have come up with some different little projects that we can do to bring awareness to the LGBTQ+ community.”

“They wanted to make a statement that we are a community that welcomes everybody and the kids see the pride flags that are painted on crosswalks all over Canada and we said why not!”

Painted with acrylic paint, the crosswalk is non-permanent but so far has held up well to rain and vehicles, including school buses driving across it.

“Everybody had a chance to have their hand at painting and rolling that paint on. It took us about just under three hours to finish up the whole thing.”

“We've had classes coming out, looking at it, standing around talking about the importance of being a welcoming and inclusive community. We've just been getting rave reviews and comments from people about it.”

“We had several of our grade seven and eight kids who were standing there crying, and just saying this is the best day of my life.”

Everyone is welcome to check out the Progress flag crosswalk currently on display in front of the school.

The RancheView GSA is looking into raising a Pride/Progress flag outside the school as a future project.