KANE'OHE — The yearly painting of a mural on a building wall, a lost campus tradition, has returned to Castle High School, thanks to a graduate's challenge and a student's desire to give back.

Inspired by 2003 Castle graduate Aiko Yamashiro's essay that challenges fellow students to act, Castle senior Ashlie Duarte-Smith planned and organized a project, and raised $500 — including $200 of her own money — to create a large mural on a wall facing Kane'ohe Bay Drive.

Yamashiro's essay mourns the death of many Castle traditions and prods people to rekindle them or make new ones. The essay is required reading for all of Diane Lee's English students.

Castle High traditions that had fallen silent include the murals, painting a "C" on the hillside above the Pohai Nani retirement center, homecoming parades and carnivals, Lee said. Sometimes it's for lack of effort and sometimes it's because of costs, she said.

"A lot of traditions that took somebody doing a lot of work have died," Lee said. "Kids don't want to put forth all that effort to paint the mural."

Traditions are an important part of community pride, said Yamashiro, who was thrilled about the new mural and is now a master's degree student in English at the University of Hawai'i-Manoa.

"Tradition definitely gives a group of people a sense of identity, something to do together ... like a mural," she said.

Duarte-Smith responded to the essay and thought, why not me, she said. She's an artist, and brightening up the campus with color was appealing. Duarte-Smith said she also read about the positive effects a beautiful campus can have on students.

"I hope if we inspire somebody else with this mural, the next grade, 2010, if they keep it going, then they'll inspire more people," she said. "Who knows, since we're in restructuring, maybe the grades will improve, participation will improve."

Since last week Duarte-Smith and 18 students have cleaned, primed and painted the first mural on a school wall since she arrived on campus as a freshman, she said. Over the weekend a knight — the school's mascot — wearing school colors of maroon and gold was portrayed slaying a blue and white dragon, the colors of a rival school.

Student Keri Matsushima, who designed the artwork and drew it on the wall, said most of the students in the class were inspired by the essay.

"It's just we didn't have any person to bring us all together," Matsushima said while taking a break from painting Wednesday. "Then came along (Duarte-Smith) and she gave us the drive and the will, and we all decided to help."

Murals used to be all over the school buildings, but deterioration and vandals made it necessary to paint over the works of art, leaving only blank walls.

Castle principal Meredith Maeda said he was proud of this group of students for making an old tradition a reality again. Duarte-Smith did all the groundwork including researching paint, planning and fundraising, Maeda said.

"They did well because they took the initiative and they want to bring some pride back to Castle," he said.

Duarte-Smith had another reason for organizing the project, seeing it as a way to make amends.

"I really didn't do anything for my school, and I kind of got disgusted with myself," she said. "I figured what better way than to use my own personal skills to really give back to all of my teachers, and especially Miss Lee, because she really touched me this year."