Utah teen turns homework assignment into neighborhood street art, community message



SYRACUSE, Utah -- Without school in session, scratching and scraping chalk against the sidewalk is one student's new art class.

Brielle Hipolito



"The teacher, she asked us, all of her art students to do some sort of a chalk drawing," said Brielle Hipolito.

Truth be told, the ninth-grader wasn't looking forward to it. So, she quickly whipped up a "Winnie the Pooh" for her project.

"I thought I should probably just get it done and over with. "I really hated chalk, cause I hate the feeling of chalk on fingers and stuff like that. But after doing one of them I realized how really easy it was to make something so cool and fun and unique."

Hipolito decided to keep going, and her mom and sister joined in. They drew more than two dozen Disney characters across the driveway and sidewalk.



"The more she does, it impresses me," said Brielle's mother, Naomi Hipolit. "Like every time she does a picture, I'm like holy cow! How'd you do that?!"

The neighbors sure noticed. Which is why Brielle has been doing touch-up so it doesn't fade. If you study the sidewalk, you'll see underneath a few of the characters a message: "We miss you grandma."

"She always loved animated characters, she thought they were just so cute," Brielle said.  "I think that was the one thing that she really remembered, too. Because she had dementia, so she was forgetting a lot of things. But she always, no matter what, always loved Disney character.

Her grandmother just passed away and the display has turned into a tribute.

Next to their message for grandma, they wrote one for the whole community with inspiration from "Peter Pan" -- "Think Happy Thoughts".

"I really hope that it gives people a smile and kind of makes someone's day with just seeing something cute like this," said Brielle.

The ninth-grader passed her assignment -- and even got extra credit.