One of the only old school chalkboards at Short Pump Middle School can be found in the classroom of art teacher Brendan Rossner, who has used chalk to merge two of his biggest passions: art and football.
For 15 years, Rossner has used the full surface of a classroom chalkboard to draw a Super Bowl mural. His annual project continued with this year's Eagles-Chiefs matchup, depicting Philadelphia's Saquon Barkley and Kansas City's Chris Jones with the Super Bowl LIX logo.
"It's kind of celebrating chalk as a medium. And it's something that only really exists in a school setting: a chalkboard," he said.
Rossner uses the two-week gap ahead of the Super Bowl to digitally map out his design and bring his vision to life via chalk, and he's purchased plenty of extra chalk to account for the different colors of all the Super Bowl contenders.
“My favorite one was Rams-Bengals. From a color standpoint, it’s just great,” he said. “The new Rams colors were fantastic, and then Cincinnati is in the absolute pantheon of uniforms. So I really enjoyed working on that one.”
Rossner, who is in his 18th year of teaching at Short Pump Middle, spends downtime during a couple school days or any other planning days available to put it all together. He’s grateful for the maintenance team that helped him move an unused chalkboard into his classroom for easy access, as chalkboards have been largely replaced by whiteboards and Promethean boards.
His murals have become more detailed since his first creation in 2010 for the Super Bowl matchup between Drew Brees’ Saints and Peyton Manning’s Colts. He’s incorporated more textures and colors into each player over time and has tried to improve at replicating facial features and eyes.
The players or figures chosen tend to be the biggest players representing each team, but Rossner has tried to mix it up for teams like the Patriots and Chiefs, who have made the big game several times in the past 15 years, so it doesn't feel too stale. Coach Bill Belichick is positioned behind Tom Brady in the mural he made for Super Bowl LI in 2017, while Taylor Swift makes a cameo with Travis Kelce in last year's mural for Super Bowl LVIII.
He’ll start to hear from staff and students about what he has planned next when the NFL season is approaching its conclusion each year.
“Our staff loves it. I try to share it with former colleagues who moved on to other schools,” he said. “There are a lot of younger siblings coming through my classroom that are like, ‘Oh, my sister told me you do this!’
“It’s just a cool little tradition.”
Rossner hopes he’ll get the chance to use the right shade of blue and red in the coming years for a Super Bowl appearance from Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills — he and his wife's favorite team.
“One day, if the Bills ever make it, anyone who has a chalkboard, I’ll come and visit and do something for them. I can’t wait.”