Recently, West Marion Elementary students Mason Thomas, Anna Hargis, Isaiah Gray, Josie Bell and Peter Cecil -- all members of the school’s Page Ambassador program -- made their way down one of the school’s hallways taking turns pulling a rolling cart filled with soft drinks on top, candy bars in the middle section, and chips on the bottom (“three layers of happiness” as Principal Daniel Mattingly called it). But the treats weren’t intended for students. Instead, the Page Ambassadors were on their way to visit each classroom to surprise teachers and staff members with the treats.
“The teachers work very hard to teach a bunch of kids each day so they deserve a reward for it,” WMES fifth grader Anna Hargis said.
Fellow fifth grader Isaiah Gray added: “I know how hard it is for teachers to do their jobs […] even when they know what they’re doing it can still be very hard.”
However, delivering treats on the Cart of Happiness, as it’s known at WMES, wasn’t just a nice way to surprise teachers on a Friday afternoon. Instead, it was one of many things that happened throughout the week in conjunction with the annual Random Acts of Kindness Week, which is dedicated to doing good deeds for others.
Among the kindness projects in MCPS, students designed posters and buttons promoting kindness; staff members handed out buttons to students when they were “caught being kind”; students produced videos focusing on Random Acts of Kindness; all in addition to a host of other kindness-themed activities throughout the week.
At Glasscock Elementary, for example, along with the posters and “Caught Being Kind” buttons, fourth and fifth graders wrote and performed skits focusing on ways to be kind at school.
Meanwhile, at Lebanon Elementary, students created banners for each hallway on which students were invited to write kindness messages.
Marion County Middle School students put together a Kindness from Kids slideshow which was shared with the district’s elementary schools and provided daily lessons on kindness. And at Marion County Knight Academy, students were encouraged to participate in a series of dress-up days throughout the week in honor of kindness.
Back at West Marion, the students delivering treats to teachers said they saw kindness as being an important part of the school’s overall culture.
“If a teacher ever needs help, almost all the students raise their hand to help,” Gray said. “It’s good that a teacher has to choose who gets to help because there are so many volunteers.”
