EMMET COUNTY, Mich,. (WPBN/WGTU) – – A Pellston family has taken significant steps this year to promote suicide prevention and awareness.

After raising approximately $3,400, they donated a suicide prevention and awareness bench to Pellston Middle/High School and Veteran’s Memorial Park.

Students and staff at the school will also receive suicide awareness shirts.

Shoshanna Williamson, a sixth-grader, and her mother, Tammy, are driven by a personal mission to ensure no one feels alone.

“I just wanted to do this because my cousin Bella, she committed suicide. So, I had an idea to start this and my mom was fully aware with it and she wanted me to do this too,” Shoshanna said.

Tammy Williamson emphasized the importance of the initiative, saying, “It was due to bullying downstate. And it got me thinking about my little sister who attended Pellston years ago and she had also committed suicide. So, when Sho suggested we do the benches, obviously I was 100% behind it to help support anything to help the school and other kids.”

Shoshanna’s efforts began in fifth grade when she noticed her classmates struggling to make friends.

She collected cans and received cash donations to purchase a “buddy bench.”

This year, her project expanded to include a suicide prevention bench.

“So, this bench means a lot to me because a lot of kids at my school when I was younger said that they wanted to commit suicide because they were really depressed. So, this bench kind of means a lot to me because I’m trying to save lives with this bench,” Shoshanna explained.

The bench serves as a symbol of community, achieved through collective efforts of collecting cans and donations.

Shoshanna and Tammy hope people will take pictures with the bench and share them on social media.

Tammy noted, “Late night is when a lot of kids are on their phones, depression, anxiety, bullying online. If they see a picture with the 988 hopefully they’ll know that there’s help or think about it, that they’ll see the picture enough or walk by the benches enough to remember the number and spread the word that there’s help out there for them and there’s other ways to deal with it besides taking your life.”

In addition to the bench at the school, a second bench was placed at Veteran’s Memorial Park, recognizing the importance of mental health resources for veterans.

Shoshanna expressed her hopes for the bench’s impact, saying, “I think this bench is going to mean a lot to the community because there’s a lot of people now in the world that just feel anxious, like they don’t have any friends, depressed.”