Date Published: 02/13/2020 [Source]
Faith Hinton didn't want to get her hopes up after entering a poster contest last December.
"I didn't think I was going to win," said Hinton, a fifth-grade student at Woodland Park Elementary.
Hinton was awarded $200 for earning first place in the division of grades 3-6 for her poster depicting radon awareness. The Wyoming Cancer Program, a division of the Wyoming Department of Health, sponsors a statewide contest annually.
"The radon component of the Wyoming Cancer Program provides information to Wyoming residents, contractors, and real estate agents about radon," according to its website.
Hinton's classroom was also awarded $100, which has been used to establish a classroom library in Hinton's name. Hinton credited her teacher, Sara Stevens, with the idea.
Prior to the contest, Hinton admitted she didn't know what radon was. But Stevens taught her students with supplemental materials about radon that came with the invitation to participate.
"Radon comes out of the earth, so I thought it would be cool to have the earth cracked in half," Hinton said.
"I want people to know that it can be very harmful, and that it's actually very common in a lot of areas, including Sheridan. Our class looked at a map, and it's all over the United States, which is crazy to think about," Hinton said.