Westview Elementary, Shadle Park high students collaborate on Garland District mural

In an alley marked with colorful graffiti off Post Street and Garland Avenue, students gathered with paint rollers and donuts as they worked together to create a mural.

Tuesday marked the fourth year that Tiffiny Santos, a third-grade teacher at Westview Elementary School, brought her students' lessons to life. The class chose a book that inspired them and used the images and themes to create a mural.

Her class learned about how caring for yourself is an act of community through the book "I Am We: A Book of Community" by Susan Verde.

Santos and her class used imagery of hot-air balloons from the book and picturesque mountain lake views to create a design for the Garland Art Alley.

"It's a little bit of chaos and crazy," she said. "And so much joy."

Preparing the mural

Julie Shepard, the curator for the Garland Art Alley, helped Santos' class find walls for their murals. Across from this year's mural is the prior class' creation, forming a colorful corridor in the alley.

"It's a great community project," she said. "It gives the kids some ownership."

Creating a mural takes a village, and the Westview third-graders worked with local muralist Desmond Boston and Shadle Park High School leadership students to bring the idea to fruition.

Leading up to the day, the third-graders pitched ideas to Boston, who then created a digital rough draft. The draft included four hot-air balloons, mountains, water and sea creatures. Each sea creature, including sharks, was chosen by Santos' students.

The Westview crew spent only an hour at the alley, so Boston had to prepare the wall ahead of the visit.

The Shadle Park students lent their time, making trips to the paint store, priming the wall and planning the event.

"They've got finals, proms, school wrap-ups, college admissions," Boston said. "And they're still making time for this project."

Tanner Johnson, a senior in Shadle Park's leadership class, planned the outing. He, along with his classmates, visited Westview to excite the kids about painting and aided Boston in the prep work. However, the most important part for Johnson was working with the next generation of Shadle Park students.

"It's very important to Shadle that we get to make a connection with our feeder schools," he said. "So it's a really good thing that we do to spark that connection between Shadle and our younger kiddos."

Westview arrives

As the doors of a yellow school bus opened, the Westview students skipped toward the alley wall with giggles and step ladders in tow. Both high schoolers and elementary students greeted each other with trending dance moves and hugs.

The groups then scrambled into pairs, one third-grader for each high school student, to paint their designated sea creature.

Third-grader Liam Livingstone worked with Maddie Mann, a Shadle Park senior and family friend, to paint a rubber duck in the center of the mural. The lesson he took from the book and the creation of the mural was the importance of creativity.

"My favorite part about painting this today is how I can do whatever I want in whatever colors," he said.

Ethan Cabrera, a Shadle Park senior, hoisted kids on his shoulders to paint the mural's hot-air balloons. He hopes to be a special education teacher and enjoys the leadership class because of the opportunity it gives him to work with kids.

"Being able to be out here with the kids and just help them be better and learn," he said, "it's just awesome."

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This story was originally published June 2, 2026 at 7:06 PM.