Othello student wins $1,000 for Hiawatha art supplies

OTHELLO — Othello resident and fifth-grader at Hiawatha Elementary School Logan Hampton was selected as one of 40 national winners for his popsicle stick art as part of the Popsicle brand’s Stick with Art! contest, providing $1,000 to the winners’ school to purchase art supplies. 

The contest submissions ended in December, but Hampton said he didn’t find out that he had won until it was announced at a school assembly in January, alongside the announcement that he was Hiawatha’s student of the month. 

“(I was) surprised,” he said. “It was embarrassing.”

Hampton’s mother, Casie Hampton, also said the news that he had won was surprising. She said they had found out about the contest from Logan Hampton’s art teacher a few days before the Dec. 10 deadline. The Hamptons had to post a photo of the art on Popsicle’s Instagram as the art submission. She said they worked for quite a while over the weekend.

“We were literally handed the information for it Friday when we were going home and (his teacher) was just like, “I think Logan would be interested in doing this. It needs to be turned in on Sunday,’” Casie said. “You have to get permission forms from all the parents, and then she knew that I could probably get on and actually enter it for him through Instagram.”

Since the contest was near Christmas, Logan decided to build Santa’s sleigh and reindeer out of popsicle sticks. He said the contest didn’t have any theme or rules.

“I wasn’t sure what to do at first, and then I just thought about (the sleigh and reindeer) and I figured that they might be a little bit easier to make than, like, a house,” he said.

The Hamptons did some research on how to make the popsicle reindeer look proportionally correct, but Casie said Logan came up with and implemented the design for Santa’s sled all by himself. 

Logan said he likes his art class, but he wasn’t sure what his favorite subject is. Logan did say he would enter the contest again next year.

“It was pretty fun,” he said.

According to Popsicle’s website, the contest is a partnership between Popsicle and the National Art Education Association to help “bridge the arts education gap,” helping more students access arts education through a three-year, $500,000 initiative.

The winners could help win much larger funding for schools.

“(The) selected winners will be invited to apply for larger $10K-$20K grants to support school-wide initiatives that help close the arts gap by advancing equity, diversity, and inclusion in their arts education programming,” the website says. 

For more information on the contest, visit popsicle.com.

Gabriel Davis may be reached at gdavis@columbiabasinherald.com.

    Exterior of Hiawatha Elementary School in Othello, which was awarded $1,000 for the purchase of art supplies after fifth-grader Logan Hampton’s popsicle stick art submission was selected as one of 40 national winners of Popsicle’s Stick with Art! competition.