By: K. Michelle Moran | Grosse Pointe Times | Published May 19, 2026
GROSSE POINTE PARK — Drawing inspiration from Mother Nature, Grosse Pointe Park fourth graders commemorated Arbor Day with posters showcasing their artistic abilities.
And while the Grosse Pointe Park Beautification Commission notes that all the posters created by the students are winners, three of the most outstanding entries were honored in front of the Grosse Pointe Park City Council during a meeting May 11.
“We are here to celebrate our wonderful fourth grade poster contest winners for 2026,” Beautification Commission Chair Lisa Kyle said.
Pat Deck, longtime chair of the Beautification Commission’s Arbor Week Poster Contest, said they enjoyed “absolutely outstanding” participation by the schools that serve the Park, with 147 posters submitted out of a pool of 154 students.
“We are so pleased to be able to honor our fourth graders who have done such an excellent job on their posters,” Deck said.
Trees provide food and shelter for wildlife, shade from the sun, wood for construction and fireplaces, and supply oxygen and remove pollutants from the air, among their many benefits. Trees are also known to increase property values.
“The Arbor Week poster contest is a wonderful way to educate our schoolchildren and our community on the value and benefits of trees,” Deck said.
The contest winner was Amelia Depcinski, whose poster shows a girl sitting on a tree branch, reading a book, with the phrase, “My tree is My Happy Place.” Deck said the poster comes from Depcinski’s own experience, as she likes to sit in a tree in her backyard and read.
One of the two runners-up was Eleanor Larson. Her poster features a squirrel holding a tiny, smiling tree as an acorn drops from a bigger nearby tree and reads, “I’m Nuts About Trees.”
The second runner-up was Josephine Insisiengmay, whose poster likens a tree to a bodybuilder. She depicted a muscular tree able to hold a tree house, a tree swing, a reading child and a bird’s nest. She also included a message that reads: “Trees represent resilience and endurance, with deep roots that allow it to withstand storms, making it a powerful symbol of inner strength.”
This year, all three winners came from Maire Elementary School. Judging is done blindly by members of the Beautification Commission — they don’t know who the artists are or which school they’re from — so having all three winners hail from the same school is purely coincidental, but it has happened before.
Mayor Michele Hodges said this annual tradition recognizes “the imagination and creativity of the young people in our community.”
All the poster contest entrants received a Michigan white pine seedling — the state tree — to plant in their yard, Deck said.
This year marks the Park’s 43rd as a Tree City USA, a designation from the nonprofit Arbor Day Foundation.
The Tree City USA designation “encourages communities to increase their tree canopy and enrich their urban forest,” Kyle said.
“We are also designated as a Platinum Tree City,” Deck said. “This is a prestigious award given (by the Arbor Day Foundation) to only a few cities in the state of Michigan.”
All the student posters are temporarily displayed at City Hall and in local businesses. And this year, for the first time, people will be able to see all the entries online by visiting grossepointepark.org/235/Arbor-Day. The online gallery will remain available until April 2027, when it will be replaced by a new crop of entries.