An effort to improve the overall look of the City of Jefferson came to a head on Monday as a group of Iowa State University College of Design students presented their final projects.

The seniors and graduates of the Retail Scapes class have been working with Jefferson Matters: Main Street (JMMS), the City of Jefferson, ISU Extension and the Greene County Chamber since January on developing various projects to “brand” and improve the look of Jefferson. The public got to see close to 20 projects at the Sierra Community Theatre, which ranged from establishing art and sculptures along Highway 4 and Lincoln Way, to creating upscale restaurants, to re-purposing the middle school as apartments and several others.

JMMS Program Director Peg Raney tells Raccoon Valley Radio what she likes the most from working with the students.

“I’m really impressed because this is the quality of students that are coming from Iowa State University, this is real life experience with them talking to community members, making adjustments in the ideas of their projects and then coming back from their final presentations.”

Raney says the next steps are to continue to discuss with the groups of people that are involved and figure out how they can start to implement some of the projects going forward.