The Center for Performing Arts in Pell City has set a date for its newest podcast to be released on Tuesday, May 17. “Sem;colon,” a project which has taken form now in social media campaigns, podcast and a short film.

The project is created and led by teens in St. Clair County to raise suicide awareness. The podcast was created as part of the Spotlight Black Box Podcast program. Upon its release it can be found on popular podcast apps such as Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

The podcast centers around the story of a young girl who is battling with her mental health. It also includes real testimonials from students about how they face mental health issues in their day-to-day life.

Anna Claire Hathorn and other students participating in CEPA’s Spotlight Black Box program, spoke to the Pell City Rotary Club about the importance of their project on Tuesday.

A semicolon is used as a national sign for suicide awareness. It suggests a point an author could have put a period, but chose to keep going by using a semicolon.

“The semicolon is the author struggling through hard times, the sentence is their life. The semicolon is them overcoming their hard times,” said Hathorn.

The project began as an assignment for Hathorn when she was tasked to create a short film for the Pell City High School film club. She chose to raise awareness for suicide after seeing suicide hotline information in the school bathroom.

The silent film symbolized a story about a struggling girl that seems to be fine, but she’s having internal struggles with mental health. The story follows her battling her own thoughts of hopelessness.

“Jeff Thompson saw the film and thought it brought to life a very real problem that we face in our community,” said Hathorn.

PCHS students Hathorn, Emma Gibson and Dylan Kielbasa were challenged by Thompson, CEPA director, to rewrite the silent film with more detail so it could go on to be developed as a podcast. In partnership with CEPA and the Spotlight Blackbox program, the students recorded a 47-minute podcast.

The story has also been developed into a short film, which was in production earlier this year. There’s no release date for this part of the project at this time.

“One of our goals is that these storylines will help open conversations among people who see or hear it. We want to give people a safe place to come when they feel alone or that no one else understands how they feel that’s how most people have struggled with this feel,” said Hathorn.

Hathorn said she hopes the lessons learned through media they are creating will help those who are struggling with mental health issues feel more confident in reaching out to receive professional treatment.

“One in three teens struggle with their mental health. Everyone over their lifetime struggles with mental health and it’s just a part of being human,” said Hathorn.

Another outlet of the overall project of Sem;colon has been community engagement by writing social media posts that help people identify the symptoms of depression, anxiety, PTSD and OCD.

“Something I strongly believe everyone could learn is how serious unmanaged mental health is and how it takes a toll on teens, especially today,” said Hathorn.

She said parental figures can tend to believe that mental health is not a real issue and is sometimes used as a means to just seek attention. She said this can push many teens to not come forward about their struggles, which is why she is so passionate about the overarching project.