You may have walked around and spotted maroon and gold, whether in the cafeteria, in the buildings, on the building walls, in the gyms, or on the outside lunch tables. Oftentimes, as students, we see maroon and gold everywhere around campus at Pahrump Valley High School, and we have been seeing it for a long time. Maroon and gold have been here ever since 1974. Seeing these two colors can cause curiosity to rise. What do these colors mean? What do they represent? Why are they all over? Do they symbolize anything? How are they even important? How did they even start in the first place?
Well, it’s unknown what they symbolize or mean, as they started in 1974, and most of our staff weren’t around at that time; although, it is part of our school history, therefore, you could possibly see it as a symbol of our school history.
Our school mascot comes from a time in history where maroon and gold were used specifically, so it could be seen that way, as a way to complement the school mascot and the history it came from. It could be assumed to be symbolic for our school mascot.
Assistant Principal Kristin Baker estimates, “My guess is we are trying to imitate USC.” Our two main school colors could be a way of imitation, a way to imitate the University of Southern California.
Maroon and gold are our two main school colors. They’re very important to our school as a whole. They show our school’s pride and represent our school itself. They set us apart from other schools, make us stand out, and make us easy to find as a school. They’re a way to show our school pride. They’re unifying; they bring our school together as a whole. “It’s unifying, yes,” Baker said as a description of those two colors and their importance to the school, while Principal Desiree Veloz says “It brings us together, like how you might see someone wearing the same glasses as you. Like: ‘Hey, I like your glasses!’”
Moreover, when Veloz searched up the meaning of the two colors, maroon as a color may represent courage and strength, while gold may represent excellence and significance. Some might see maroon as a way of bravery, and gold as a way of success and importance.
It’s hard to tell what started them and how they started, but they definitely did start in the first place because we needed a set of colors to represent us as a school. Every school needs something to represent them, like a mascot, color, or both, like how we have our two colors to stand us apart as a school.
“I’m going to assume a committee.” Veloz states as a guess as to what started the school colors.
Some might not enjoy our school colors, while others might see them as a great choice and fit well together, as well as being good design. It depends on the person themselves. Other common colors, like blue, orange, green, yellow, brown, black, white, red, purple, and pink may represent many things depending on opinions.
It really depends on how the eyes see it. They can mean and represent anything depending on opinion, similarly to how one might enjoy one color, while another might enjoy a different one. We are all different in personality, likes, and dislikes. We’re all unique in our own way.
