In December of 2019, Mia Anderton, 12, submitted a design for the AT&T/Believe KC Suicide Prevention Mural Design Competition. In 2019, she submitted the design in her graphic design II class. She was selected as the winner but wasn’t contacted until this summer. 

“Right before winter break of sophomore year, that was the start of the competition. We were supposed to get results in the spring, but it was the spring of 2020. So we didn’t get the results back, and I thought the contest was over, but they contacted me in the summer of this year and told me that I have won,” Anderton said.

Her design will be put on a building somewhere within the Kansas City area. Anderton said that the feeling of having her design painted on a building in Kansas City is unreal and won’t really sink in until her design is up there.

“The mural itself says ‘Let Your Light Shine.’ Especially as dark as the world we live in is, it’s good to shine a little light whatever that looks like. Knowing that even if things are hard, even that little bit of light you can shine and it not only [helps] yourself, it helps everyone else knowing your worth. I hope that’s what people take from that,” Anderton said.