A student artist at Fayetteville-Manlius High School is tackling the difficult issue of school gun violence through a ceramic project. But, there was a chance her work wouldn't be seen in the school's art showcase. Our Corina Cappabianca shares the student's message, and the push to get it out to the public.

When Fayetteville-Manlius High School student Sadie Raynor started a ‘pop art’ unit in her ceramics class, she wanted to bring awareness to the topic of school gun violence.

“Recently was the Parkland Florida shooting, and it just meant a lot to me, so I really wanted to bring that out in a sculpture. So, I made a backpack very colorful on the outside with guns and dark colors on the inside,” Raynor said. “It has the three guns, I did the semi-automatic rifle and two pistols pointing straight up, almost coming out of the backpack just to kind of represent people's hidden emotions that you don't see every day,” she continued.

After hard work, and patience, Sadie says she was relieved when she finished the project. But, on Friday she called her mom.

“She called and she said, ‘Mom can you pick me up today? Because I want to bring my project home.’ And I said, ‘What do you mean you're bringing your project home?’ And, she said, ‘Well it's not going to be in the art show,’” said Sadie’s mom Kelli Hawk.

A spokesperson for the school said staff wanted to be sure the project abided by the code of conduct. Over the weekend, Sadie's mom took to Facebook.

“Let's rally some people and get some feedback. Let's see if parents are against it and nervous about their kids and the reaction, so let's see what people say,” she said.

Kelli says she got supportive messages from people all over the country. The school ultimately decided to let Sadie's work be shown.

“It wasn't about guns, it wasn't about gun control, it wasn't anything about that and I wanted to make sure that they saw what the project really meant. And it was about how people in general just have that façade and what could be going on in the background and how we could approach that and maybe start working towards a solution there instead of looking at things on the back end, or waiting until something happens,” said Kelli.

“If I can get one community, one school, you know just one person, one little group just to start doing something then I've fulfilled what I've planned on doing and that's all that really matters,” Sadie said.

Sadie says it took about two months to complete the project.