Winners of Paint Your School Orange contest announced

By BRITTANY FHOLER
Cove Leader-Press

The top three winners of the Copperas Cove Independent School District campuses that participated in the Paint Your School Orange Campaign were announced at the CCISD board of trustees meeting Tuesday evening. 
All 11 campuses participated in the campaign, switching out the blue and gold for orange to show the bullying is not tolerated in the district. 
The campaign is the brainchild of Preteen Miss Five Hills Dorianna Gilbert, who is a seventh grader at S.C. Lee Junior High. Gilbert’s platform is anti-bullying. She raised more than $900 with her Lemonade Day lemonade stand and hosted the Suicide Prevention Walk with the CCHS DECA chapter last month, where she used a portion of her funds, according to Volunteer Pageant Director and CCISD Communications Director Wendy Sledd. Gilbert still wanted to do more for her platform and cause, thus came the Paint Your School/City Orange campaign. 
The Copperas Cove Five Hills royalty split into two teams to judge the entries, with one team judging the 11 schools and one team judging the 16 businesses that have gone orange. 
Initially, the plans were to only select one winner, Sledd shared at Tuesday’s meeting. However, the entries were so good that they had to expand it to three winners. 
The third-place winner of the Paint Your School Orange Campaign is Crossroads High School.
The second-place winner of the Paint Your School Orange Campaign is House Creek Elementary School. 
The first-place winner of the Paint Your School Orange Campaign is Mae Stevens Early Learning Academy. 
Both the 1st place school winner and the business winner receive a $100 cash prize from Gilbert’s Lemonade Day funds. 
Sledd shared some feedback from some of the school counselors regarding the campaign. One counselor said, “I honestly don’t care who wins. I’m grateful that our district put so much thought into such an important issue and made it fun.”
The business winners will be announced at the Copperas Cove Chamber of Commerce Mixer held next Friday, on October 28, at Crawford Bowers Funeral Home at 5:30 p.m.