On Oct. 1, students bought variations of a spray painted ”Talk to me” T-shirt designed by seniors Miles Mathews and Sam Zeif.

Though the general design was relatively simple–a profile of a face speaking the words “talk to me”–the meaning that resonated from both the T-shirts and the event itself sparked a call for change at Gunn.

This project was initiated and carried out by Mathews and Zeif in response to the recent suicides. “We did this because we realized that the issue, whatever it was, wasn’t going to just go away by itself,” Mathews said. “We’ve done a lot of T-shirt making in the past, so when we thought of what we could contribute, we instantly thought of making these shirts. It’s a very simple thing that will hopefully have a large impact on the community.”

Mathews, Zeif and other students who contributed to this project hope that through this event, there will be an increase of communication and openness in the community. “The deaths last year were shocking, and I feel that the entire community felt the intense pain of realizing that our little town isn’t always so happy-go-lucky,” senior Hillary Stangel, who helped publicize and distribute the T-shirts, wrote in an e-mail message. “Hopefully these shirts will let students know that we support them and that we really do care for them,” she said. “It is not a memorial for those who have passed away. Rather, it is a course of action to impress upon others the true importance of increased communication.”

Students may be asked to wear their shirts to school on specific days scattered throughout the year. “It’d be really cool to see this project continuing beyond just the selling of the shirts,” Mathews said. “The ultimate goal is to really bring the community closer together and that cannot be done through a one-time event.”

The T-shirts, which were five dollars each, were sold out within 30 minutes of the lunch period. With this money, Mathews and Zeif were able to completely pay back all expenses as well as raise some funds for the KARA Foundation. From now on, all future funds that are raised through this project will go towards the KARA Foundation, which is a support group that has helped and will continue to help grieving students and families. “Besides the fundraiser aspect of it, I think it’s just a really great thing that people in the community can wear these shirts,” Zeif said. “It’s not necessarily the money that we raise that’s important, but rather the fact that wherever we go, we can carry this message of communication with us.”

To help convey the message more successfully, Mathews and Zeif came up with a design that they believed was both straightforward and sensitive to the issue. “We knew we didn’t want to be blunt and just write, ‘students against suicide,’ because that wasn’t at all what we were trying to say,” Zeif said. “There also needed to be a cool design that students could relate to, and hopefully that’s what we have going on right now.”

Each of the T-shirts is handmade and has a unique color pattern which Mathews and Zeif designed themselves. To mass-produce the shirts, they built a rig where they could place a cardboard stencil on. One person loads the shirt onto a mat, and the other proceeds to spray paint it with the selected design. This process, on average, takes 30 seconds to two minutes for each shirt. “At first we were just going to do solid colors and everyone would end up having the same shirt, but we tried to make each shirt unique,” Mathews said. “It enhances the message of having different students communicate with each other and I think people will want to wear the shirts more if they are different.”

Even though many students have offered to lend a hand, on the whole, it has been mainly Mathews and Zeif who have been making the T-shirts. “We will definitely think about whether or not we need people to help us out,” Zeif said. When we’re making hundreds and hundreds of shirts, it gets tough and we’ll need more hands.” Since using a rig is a two-person job, Mathews and Zeif would need to make more rigs before they can ask for others help.

Some community members and students have also suggested that the project be branched out to other schools such as Palo Alto High School. Though Mathews and Zeif are considering this possibility, they are unsure of what role they want to play in establishing these community events.

“If such a thing were to happen, it’d be really great, but it couldn’t be all Miles and me,” Zeif said. “Making hundreds of shirts is quite a task. I’m definitely not against branching out, but somebody would have to take that up at their school.”

Mathews and Zeif may make the stencil available online and post a short tutorial on how to make the shirts so it is possible for other students to bring the message to their respective schools.

Overall, Mathews and Zeif said that the event went far beyond their expectations. “I was really shocked at how well this all went,” Zeif said. “We scheduled our original event for two days, but then all of our shirts were sold in half an hour instead. I was very pleasantly surprised and I think it’s great that people have been able to embrace this project.”

Mathews agreed. “Everything went very well and I was very happy with the number of students participating,” he said. “We are raising a lot of money for KARA and the best part is that you can see the community coming together as we all support this cause. I am very glad to see this project come together.”