Making a difference is something that students often want to do but don’t really know how to do. Katie Spooner, a junior at MHS, took matters into her own hands and decided to make a difference. She started to make T-shirts to help raise awareness for suicide prevention. Although the T-shirts are important, her end goal is much bigger than that.

“I chose to make the T-shirts to start a fundraiser for this compassion courtyard.” Spooner said. “I teamed up with the teachers to create this space, in the courtyard outside of the art rooms, to have a safe place for anyone to really go to and to have a place to remember those we’ve lost to suicide.”

She intends for this to be a place for anyone to go whenever they may need it. While the main focus is still preventing suicide, Spooner would like for this to hopefully bring people together and improve the connections of students around the school. A better connection within the student body would help more people feel like they are wanted and hopefully take steps towards preventing something like this from happening in the future.

A sculpture will be placed in the compassion courtyard.

“The sculpture will be of a person reaching out to symbolize you need to reach out to people and sometimes be the person they reach out to,” Spooner said.

This will serve as a reminder to the students of what the courtyard is supposed to stand for. It will also help add something to make the area truly special and to show people how much others are willing to work to help them through their problems.

In order to raise money for this sculpture Spooner has made T-shirts that she will be selling to anyone who is interested.

“I decided to make the shirts solely for suicide prevention because it is something that has personally affected me as an issue, and personally affected me for losing people to suicide,” Spooner said, “and that’s a feeling that I don’t want anyone to ever go through.”

She hopes to reach out to anyone who may be struggling and remind them that they still have an important place in the world. Reaching out to even one person and showing them the phone number could make a world of difference.

Each shirt costs $20 and can be bought by direct contact with Katie Spooner at either her phone number (307)460-0631 or her email .

“I made them as a fundraiser to create that place at Manhattan High that I think we need as a community,” Spooner said, “but also as a way to reach out for something I feel really really strongly about.”