Hello all, and welcome back to another slightly depressing blog post todays topic is blue sky 2k19, although this wasn’t my first exhibition this was my first Blue Sky, and honestly I really hope I get the chance to do another one, I have/had so many more ideas for possible projects but this exhibition I settled on making a website to raise awareness for the highway of tears, you can visit this website right here.

At the start of blue sky I originally wanted to do something about green energy but quickly realized that most of my project ideas had been done before or were too large of undertakings for a grade 9 student with an IPad and a couple months. The weekend after blue sky started me and my mom went up north to Terrace, BC and on the way back I started noticing all the missing peoples signs that were scattered along highway 16, I already knew about The Highway of Tears but seeing the signs made me remember that there family’s that are still looking for lost loved ones. So I decided to make my project about the highway of tears, I immediately knew that I wanted to make an interactive map (which you can see in my website) I debated between making an app within keynote or making a website with WordPress, eventually I decided to make a website because I thought I could make it look nicer and this way I could actually have anyone visit my project.

So I got my pitch approved and got to work, first I made a list of all the documented missing peoples cases that fall under the Highway of Tears area, next I started the website and here’s the thing I didn’t know much about making websites so I kindly asked my father who is web developer to show me the ropes, and surprisingly it wasn’t super duper hard, first we planned out what I wanted the website to look like, and I made a mock-up design on Adobe Illustrator. 

(Rough drafts on how the website would look)

After this my dad helped me pick out a salient theme (similar to the themes that you see on other students blogs but more cool and less free), then we copy and pasted our designs into the theme and put in another plug in to make the pop ups that you see on the map.

After this the website was pretty much ready so I started research on the history and a little tid bits of info about Highway 16 after putting that into the website and moving the titles around so everything fit I was done. The exhibition went really well, and I had a lot of fun, it was a great way to end the year (sort of) and I’m really proud of this website.

Overall, this project taught me a lot about BC’s untold history, and about making websites, this was one of my best looking projects all year and I’m excited for any future blue sky’s I might be able to partake in. So, as always thanks for reading and have great rest of your day/evening.