News & Events
Identity Guidelines
This page provides guidelines for using logos, colors, and other visual cues related to Mars Hill College’s institutional identity. Consistent use of these items will help us project a unified visual message about the college. Please address any questions or suggestions to Mike Thornhill, Director of Communications, at mthornhill@mhc.edu.
Graphic Standards
Mars Hill College logos are the property of the college and must be used in accordance with the following instructions. The logos are to be used as stand-alone entities, and should not be used, in whole or in part, as elements of another logo design without permission from the Office of Communications.
Seal
The college seal is our primary formal graphical institutional identity. It features the cupola tower from Marshbanks Hall, silhouetted against Bailey Mountain. The inscription of Pro Christo Adolescentibusque means "For Christ and for Youth." The seal was designed in 1921 with a star in the center, revised in 1933 to replace the star with a symbolic drawing of the college and Bailey Mountain, and further revised in 1940 to the basic design still in use today (although there have been minor adjustments to it over the years). It must always be printed in a one-color format (either black, metallic gold, or the official MHC blue or gold listed below) at 100% of the color (screening the logo is not an option). The logo may also be presented in white, reversed out of any solid color. Any other usage must be approved by the Office of Communications.
EPS Seal, Encapsulated PostScript Image, best for printed documents
JPG Seal, Joint Expert Photographic Group Image, good for Web documents
TIFF Seal, Tagged Image File Format, good for printed documents
GIF Seal, Graphic Image Format, best for web documents
Cupola
The Cupola, also called "Type and Tower," is the main secondary logo. It is appropriate for most college documents, including on-campus communications and informal documents such as memorandums, posters, and programs. It should be printed in a one-color format (either black or the official MHC blue or gold listed below) at 100% of the color (screening the logo is not an acceptable usage). The logo may also be presented in white, reversed out of any solid color. Any other usage must be approved by the Office of Communications.
EPS Cupola, Encapsulated PostScript Image, best for printed documents
JPG Cupola, Joint Expert Photographic Group Image, good for Web documents
TIFF Cupola, Tagged Image File Format, good for printed documents
GIF Cupola, Graphic Image Format, best for web documents
Lion Logo
The Mars Hill College Lion logo is the primary logo used for athletics purposes. It is also acceptable for use on promotional items, but should not be used in publications other than those of the athletics department, unless prior approval is obtained from the Office of Communications.
EPS Lion Logo, Encapsulated PostScript Image, best for printed documents
JPG Lion Logo, Joint Expert Photographic Group Image, good for Web documents
TIFF Lion Logo, Tagged Image File Format, good for printed documents
GIF Lion Logo, Graphic Image Format, best for web documents
Official Colors
Blue – Pantone Matching System (PMS) Reflex Blue
Gold – Pantone Matching System (PMS) 109
Font
The logo typeface is ITC Giovanni (in small caps @ 85%), Futura Book is used for "Est. 1856." The ITC Giovanni font files are available for internal use on the college’s internal file server.
Style Guide
Official college writing style generally follows the Associated Press Stylebook ("AP Style") and/or the Chicago Manual of Style ("Chicago"), with certain institutional variances. This Mars Hill College Style Guide is a work in progress. Updates will be posted here until codified in a more formal publication and/or Web page.
A
alum, alumna, alumnae, alumni, alumnus: We will generally follow the Latin variations with alumnus used for a singular male, alumna for a singular female, alumnae for a group of female former students, and alumni for a group of males or a group of mixed gender. To avoid unnecessarily cumbersome writing, the less formal alum is acceptable for use in referring to a singular former student of either gender (the plural of alum is alums). The terms alum/alumna/alumnus are not restricted to those who graduated from MHC, but include all former students who attended at least one semester.
apostrophes in dates: Use an apostrophe to indicate the absence of "19" in a year (preference is to use all four digits, but two digits with apostrophe may be used on second and subsequent reference) but not to form a plural for a decade; e.g., ‘07, 1990s. Also note that, for printed material, the apostrophe in the example ’07 should be a "single right quote" (see your layout program’s "help" feature for instruction on inserting that special character).
Appalachia, Appalachian: Rhymes with bastion, not with nation (pronouncer from Merriam-Webster)
C
college: Lowercase the word, even when referring to MHC, unless the word is used as part of the full name of an institution.
Mars Hill College, the college
commas: Use the serial (Oxford) comma when listing items in a series. Example: "Dr. Johnson teaches accounting, philosophy, and criminal justice."
D
dates: Use figures, without commas: 1975. When a phrase refers to a month, day and year, set off the year with a comma: Feb. 14, 1987, is the target date. When a phrase refers only to a month and year, or a season and year, do not set off the year with a comma: January 2012, Fall 2009. Use an s without an apostrophe to indicate spans of decades or centuries: the 1890s, the 1800s. Years are the lone exception to the general rule in numerals that a figure is not used to start a sentence: 1976 was a very good year.
departments, divisions, and programs: Full formal names of MHC departments, divisions, and programs are capitalized: Department of Music, Department of Education. Second references or shortened versions are lowercased: biology program.
I
internet and web related words: We will follow the lead of Wired magazine: World Wide Web is capitalized, as is Web when used specifically to refer to the WWW; otherwise, internet, web, and their derivatives are not capitalized. Electronic mail is email.
T
titles: Personal titles immediately preceding a name are capitalized; those following a name or set off by commas are not. Position titles used without a name are not capitalized.
The latest discovery by Associate Professor Scott Pearson. . . Ashby F. Walker, assistant professor of sociology, has found . . .
A professor of music at MHC since 1985, Dr. Reed teaches . . .
This rule applies not only to academic titles, but also to administrative titles.
President Dan Lunsford, the president . . .
Thornhill became communications director of Mars Hill College in 2004 . . .
The director of student activities helped select the band for the dance . . .
An exception to this rule is a “named” title.
Katharine R. Meacham is the Bost Professor of Philosophy at Mars Hill College.
Treat references to the trustees of Mars Hill College in the same way as other personal titles discussed above.
Our office recently received a visit from Trustee Wayne Higgins. Bonnie Adams was previously a trustee of the college.