Student-designed signs grab attention

Mass Innovations, From The Beacon, September 2010

Is a standard yellow “Slow Children” sign the best way to discourage speeding? Needham is trying a new approach that may be more effective: traffic signage created by middle school students.

In the fall of 2008, Needham Town Manager Kate Fitzpatrick was preparing to speak with about 100 Needham eighth-graders when she decided to have the students themselves come up with the wording and design of new signs to discourage speeding.

One child drew two wavy roads with a stick-figure in between them, beneath the wording “SLOW DOWN!!! You may hurt the future.” Another student created a large red rabbit trailed by a diminutive tortoise. In big red letters are the words “DON’T BE THE HARE!!!”

Students also have produced the design and wording for signage to discourage idling in school drop-off zones and to promote safe routes for children to walk to school.

There are currently eight signs in Needham that were designed by students. Each design is passed on to the town Highway Department, which produces the signs at a cost of about $40 each.

Many motorists are so accustomed to seeing conventional traffic warning signs that they barely notice them, Fitzpatrick said. By contrast, the signs designed by children stand out both because of their content and their style.

“The empathy trigger is that children clearly made these signs,” Fitzpatrick said.

There are no data to demonstrate that the new signs are causing people to drive more carefully. But anecdotal evidence suggests that the signs are having an effect, according to Fitzpatrick. Residents, she said, frequently approach the town’s Traffic Management Advisory Committee to request child-designed signs for their neighborhoods.

In July, Needham won a Community Partnership Award from the International City/County Management Association for its “Emotionally Intelligent Signage.”

At an ICMA conference a couple years earlier, Fitzpatrick had heard author Dan Pink tout the importance of empathy in decision-making. Pink challenged his audience to create signs similar in tone to the one he encountered while in a very long line in the cafeteria of a New York City museum: “Don’t worry. This line moves really fast.”

For more information, contact Kate Fitzpatrick at (781) 455-7512, ext. 3.