There are hundreds of ways that schools can use banners to promote events, give information or serve as a directional guide. If your school is not using banners, or you aren't sure how to start implementing them at your school, here is a hypothetical example of how a school can use a banner to promote and direct guests to a concert.
Our school is holding a choir concert. This concert will feature children from every grade, so the sign does not necessarily need to be grade specific. By keeping the message on the banner general in nature, this banner can easily be reused each year.
The concert's name is the Winter Choral Concert and features a selection of holiday songs and melodies. This season will be used in the design process for the banner, to add extra visual interest.
Since the banner will just display a general message, giving the name of the event and where it will be held, this text can go in the center of the banner. The school can then focus more on the color scheme and graphics for the banner. As mentioned previously, the time of year will be used as inspiration for the graphics and the color scheme of the banner.
Winter colors are typically blue, white, green or red. Since this is a holiday concert, the school has decided to go with a white background for their sign with red and green text and graphic colors. The graphics that are being used are simple, and do not require a full-color banner.
Since the background is white, that leaves the school a little more room in their color choices. However, for this type of simple banner, a total of four or five colors can be used very well, keeping costs lower.
The graphics for the banner will include holiday wreaths, bells, and other Christmas themed designs. These graphics will be placed around the text of the banner, which is in the center. It is important to remember not to overload one area of the banner, leaving one side bereft of design. Balance is very important to effective sign design.
Now that all of the elements have been put together, the sign reads, "Winter Choral Concert," and a message containing the words, "Held in the School Auditorium" is placed under the main text. This text is in a different color from the main message, to differentiate it.
After the banner has arrived, the school will first hang the banner in the main hall, near the entrance. This will serve as a helpful reminder to the staff and the students as well as parents. On the day of the event, the banner will be moved to the hall leading to the school auditorium. Ideally, two banners would be ordered, and one would be placed directly at the entrance of the building, and the other in front of the auditorium. However, this school has ordered just one banner, so a happy medium is found by placing it between the entrance and the auditorium.