Lighting a Spark to Student Success

St HOPE Leadership Academy is a free charter middle school in Harlem, New York that prepares scholars for high school and college through its robust curriculum and rich extracurricular activities.

St HOPE enlisted Gavin’s house of talent to create and implement a new brand that had personal meaning, reflected its outcomes and propagated its mission.

Blending Knowledge and Compassion

For more than 13 years, St HOPE has been graduating scholars with excellent academic achievements through the use of a teaching model that blends knowledge growth with compassion. Seeing a need to build enhanced awareness and understanding for the school, St HOPE knew it was time to have a brand that visually reflects their unique methods of education.

A Spark Emerges

Gavin set out to create a brand that reflects the compassion and empowerment the school offers its scholars. The new logo is a direct embodiment of this, showing the spark emerge from the larger torch flame, just as St HOPE scholars leave the school at the end of their journey. Equipped with a personal charge from a faculty member, students are brighter and ready to share their light with the world. Gavin was also tasked with developing an impactful tagline that echoes the characteristics and core values of the school. And we delivered; Lighting the Spark Within And through the use of consistent branding, evocative messaging and striking imagery, Gavin implemented a market presence that communicates St HOPE’s unique points of differentiation from other schools.

Scope of Work

  • New logo and tagline
  • Brand Standards Guide
  • Updated collateral materials
  • Social media management
  • Social media ads
  • Hiring campaign on LinkedIn

The Path to Brand Success

Through Gavin’s signature BrandStorming session, we were able to thoroughly understand the client’s needs, target audiences and their characteristics so we could craft a brand that is true to their identity. This new brand has resonated deeply with the scholars, parents, community and school partners. The new logo, Spark, and the messaging we crafted helped elevate the school’s brand within their current community and has engaged numerous new parents looking to enroll their students in middle school.

To complement the new brand, Gavin also created a social media strategy that enhances engagement with the new brand, communicates its core values and builds awareness and understanding of its unique approach to education. As part of the comprehensive social media strategy, Gavin ran paid advertisements on Facebook and Instagram to drive applications to the school and increase enrollment.

Finally, Gavin developed a direct-click hiring campaign on LinkedIn to help St HOPE recruit new faculty members for specific teaching positions. The campaign uses parameters such as experience, education and geography to refine the placement of ads to the most appropriate audience members.