ATLANTA -- March 27, 2007 -- If you were asked to paint a picture of what Atlanta means to you, what would it include?  The Olympic fountains?  The Atlanta Botanical Garden?  The Varsity?  The historic Ebenezer Baptist Church?  It might be hard to decide.  But the students at Bethune Elementary had no problem at all.  As part of a program to welcome visitors coming to the 2007 NCAA Men's Final Four, the Atlanta Local Organizing Committee teamed with the Georgia Dome and the Georgia World Congress Center (GWCC) to hold Art4Atlanta - an art contest which produced a special memento to special guests visiting Atlanta.

The students' art work, which could be a drawing or painting, needed to express 'what Atlanta means to me.'  For the judging, the art work was treated like the colleges striving to make it to the Final Four -- they were divided into regions and then seeded.  In fact, each grade represented a region:  2nd grade represented the South region, 3rd grade represented the Midwest, 4th grade was the West and 5th grade was the North.  On March 11, Selection Sunday for the NCAA, the ALOC selected the art finalists -- pitting 16 seeds against number one seeds in a grueling competition that included pictures of dogwoods, the Falcons, the Hawks, the Botanical Gardens, Chastain Amphitheatre and much more.  After several close match-ups, the Art4Atlanta winners -- one from each region -- or grade -- were chosen.

"The art work was so impressive, we have decided to enlarge it for all to enjoy," said Katy Pando, Associate Director of Marketing for the Georgia World Congress Center.  In addition, the finalists' work will be displayed at the Chastain Arts Center for three weeks immediately following the NCAA Men's Final Four, and will become part of the permanent exhibit in Bethune's section of Building C in the GWCC.  The winning pictures included replicas of The Varsity, Atlanta Botanical Garden, Chastain and Bethune Elementary.

The winners are Quintayvious Darden, 2nd grade, representing the South Region; Ariyanna Hall, 3rd grade, representing the Midwest Region; Tatianna Willis, 4th grade, representing the East Region; Kemondre Brown, 5th grade, representing the West Region. 

In return for their hard work and dedication, the finalists will be recognized and their art work will be displayed on the Dome's video board during the Final Four -- Team PracticeTM,Friday, March 31.  In addition, each finalist will be awarded four tickets to NCAA® Hoop City® -- the NCAA's interactive fan festival, going on all weekend long, and their class will get to share in the fun with a pizza party. 

The Georgia Dome and the GWCC annually sponsor a semi-annual, school wide art project at Bethune Elementary and this program is serving as their spring project.

"We were so pleased to be able to leverage the GWCC's existing relationship with Bethune Elementary for this special project.  The students' art is magnificent and a wonderful way for us to welcome the NCAA and the Final Four back to Atlanta," said Anna Slive, executive director of the ALOC.

About the NCAA
The NCAA is a membership-led nonprofit association of colleges and universities committed to supporting academic and athletic opportunities for more than 380,000 student-athletes at more than 1,000 member colleges and universities. Each year, more than 54,000 student-athletes compete in NCAA championships in Divisions I, II and III sports.  Visit http://www.ncaa.org/ for more details about the Association, its goals and members and corporate partnerships that help support programs for student-athletes.  The NCAA is proud to have the following elite companies as official Corporate Champions -- AT&T, Coca-Cola and Pontiac -- and the following elite companies as official Corporate Partners -- DiGiorno, Enterprise, The Hartford, Lowe's and State Farm.