ARTY youngsters from a Kidderminster school are celebrating after putting paints and colouring pencils to paper and winning a competition to design anti-racism posters.

The competition for Wyre Forest and Hagley schools was won by pupils all from St Mary’s C.E Primary.

In first place was 10 year old Rahila Khatun, whose poster and accompanying slogan will now be entered into a national competition organised by the Show Racism the Red Card and Let’s Kick Racism Out of Football campaigns, with a chance to win further prizes and meet top footballers.

Khadija Khatun, also 10 was chosen as the Winner for Wyre Forest and Rudi Guest, 9, Wen Jie He, 10 and Rowan Downes, 9 were all runners up.

The five students were presented with their prizes at the Harriers’ ground, Aggborough Stadium, where they met players and manager Steve Burr.

Their posters were on display at the ground and they were given copies to take home, along with framed certificates and prizes.

All the Harriers players signed the children’s posters and they were also given a signed football for their school.

The poster competition was organised by Wyre Forest Youth Inclusion Community Support Officer Vanessa Halford as part of West Mercia Police’s work with young people to tackle racism, and was supported by the children’s charity Barnardo’s and the ContinU Trust consortium of schools in Wyre Forest and Hagley.

CSO Halford said: “The quality of the posters was fabulous, and it was very hard to choose a winner, but our congratulations go to St Mary’s School as all of their entries were of a very high standard.

“We hope the competition has made the young people who took part think about the racism which exists not only in football but in life.”

Paul Powell,senior practitioner for Barnardo’s, added: “It has been fantastic to see all the wonderful posters the children have created. There were some brilliant entries and we hope they have all had fun designing them.”