001Looks like we have a very fun agenda tonight. Um, we have strong minds and kind hearts project. Uh, our superintendent, Dr. Dent and Dr. Jean Shar. Perfect. All right. We'll present the strong mind and kind hearts project to the board of directors. Yeah. Take it away. So, this is my good friend Jean. Yeah. We had a chance to meet at the community summit. Yeah. And he talked to us about um the kindness project that he was working on uh in his own community. And I thought, you know what? Why not here? Yeah. Because Jean made um prior to the community summit, I had the opportunity to listen to Jean talk in the breakout session, right? Uh in more in more depth um with more details, but you know, he he just put it this way.
002In a time that's so dividing, why not bring something why why not do something that brings us together and unites us? And Jeene, you can hop in anytime. Even though Perfect. What I'm going to do is kind of set you up a little bit, but even though you need no setup, because if you don't know Jean Sherid, he is one of our heroes and um he's a legendary educator. Started out Did you teach kindergarten or first grade? I taught um well I taught second for three years to Norway where I taught two years at the international school in Staga, Norway. Okay. Okay. And then went to Alaska and taught there and then came back and taught in NIA principal superintendent some of ESD superintendent then WSU and you know the rest. Oh yeah just like
003a member of governor's cabinet and uh you know just the rest right. Um and Gene I normally don't do this but since there's only like a few of us do you mind if Jean knows who's in the room? Please do. Um Ellie, you want to start? Yes. I'm communication director. It's nice to see you again. Dave Cut, director of maintenance operations. Wonderful day. Thank you. Marina T. I'm director of capital projects. Wonderful. Good job. Tom Bowman, manager of capital projects facilities. Very good. Good. Brian, director of safety and security. Hi. Good to see you again. Here's Tricky. That's right. There's my friend who gets me to come all the time to town. Jen Black, president of the Senator Bonnie Lake Education Association. Perfect. Welcome. Good to have you here. Robin Rich, director of tech technology.
004You bet. I like your shirt. Making the tech happen for us. Michael Brandon. I'm with it as well. You bet. These two guys were great, by the way. Help me get set up. We really appreciate it. You guys, thank you. So, Gene, you've inspired us uh to really think differently about operating this school district um in terms of moving kindness from being a character trait to perhaps part of an operating system like how we do business around here like steeped and rooted in kindness. So before we get started, I'm sitting on this side of you because Jean and I are going to present this together and Tu is also here because he's been a um a big part of helping make this project together. But you have a lot of stuff in front of you.
005So let's talk about what's in front of you first. You have you're going to need to have your presentation open and that's behind your proposal. And then Jean gave you a packet that he's going to go over that has all sorts of stuff in it. You have a proposal, but you don't need it quite yet. I bought you a sticker just to kick us off because, you know, um and then you I think you each have a little sticker from Aaron as well. And then Jean the shirts and he'll tell us about those in a little bit. Okay. So, when we refer to things, that's where we're at. But let's um let's talk about kindness. Strong minds, kind hearts. Here we go. We always start with that promise and this fits so perfectly well with
006what we do here. It's all about belonging, sense of connection, making sure that kids um are known, valued, and supported. And it's so appropriate that the our elephant is wearing a graduation cap. Uh because the big elephants gave the little elephants last night their diplomas. And we um we've led them just like the big elephants do in a herd. We protected them. We made sure that they had what they needed. and um and they made it across the stage. We knew those kids last night. Each one of you um wanted to hand a certain student a diploma. They're known through connection, right? Um and everyone is just it's they're valued through kindness. Both Tony and Jeff talked about kindness last night in their speeches, which I thought was uh amazing. Um and then that they're
007supported through action. I mean, what's one thing you saw last night that shows you that through action we support our kids and really fulfill our promise? I think the standing ovation that Dudley got was pretty awesome. Yeah. You know, and it shows that every one of those students is valued by him and known by him. So, and stood out. I heard multiple people at the district office talk about kids by name um and had either some kind of connection or something about them, but just all through the night. Oh, so and so did this. Oh, did you see so and so um by name? And I don't know. I think it was just something you feel the staff and the students. I mean it was it was just a genuine um just a genuine happiness
008and connection for all the students. It wasn't you know I mean people are there it's late it's busy they've had long days. It wasn't a a duty to to have to be there. It was you know a want to be there and to be part of that for those kids. They felt cut. Yeah. back hallway staff and kids and everybody knowing everybody having fun. Yep. The continued excitement when student went up there and then crowd would roar, you know, unbelievably loud. Yeah. It was like unbelievably loud. Yeah. Wasn't just their parent. It was everybody go here and there. It was just Yeah. It was really amazing. And it didn't stop. It didn't stop. And then I look off to my right and I see a certain someone in the stands. Yeah. uh taking pictures of
009all sorts of that could have been reported by I'd like you to see Marily over there because Marily knows these kids. She spends time with them. I mean last night it just didn't happen. I mean it was 13 years of a lot of preparation and a lot of this promise being put into action. And it does leave a it does leave a footprint. Um, you know, I was trying to turn out of Maple Lawn the other day. If you've ever tried to turn right out of Maple Lawn onto Valley or the Oring Highway, um, and you're not using the light. I don't know what road that is, but G. Is it G? No, it's Gary. Gary. And you're trying to take a right onto the highway or valley. Like, you just hope somebody lets you
010in, right? Well, somebody did. And I just thought they that was just so nice and kind, right? So the next day when I'm coming to work on the highway, somebody needed to turn right onto the ord highway. Um I just still don't know that street either. I pass it every day. So I thought, you know what? I'm going to let that person in. Yeah. Because somebody did it for me yesterday. I'm going to let somebody do it today. And then I was at the store and see when you start looking for this, you see it everywhere. I was at the store and I forgot my grocery bag. So I had to use those eight cent bags, you know, and I couldn't get it open. because they stick together and I had stuff in my hands
011or whatever. So, so she laughs. Yeah, it was kind of a little bit of a mess. But then the lady um came over and she opened it for me and I said, "Well, that was nice. Thank you." And she's like, "Oh, honey, I'll help you anytime." And she's just so kind and nice where she could have said, "Oh, you're so stupid. Why don't you put your stuff down?" And you know, she didn't choose that path. She left a footprint of kindness with me because now every time I see her, I just love her. She's just so um welcoming and friendly. And I mean, think about sometime like recently that someone has done something kind for you. What was that? Well, I mean, just a few minutes ago, Aaron gave us a little sticker, right? I
012have one, too. He has one. You can put it on my forehead. When has someone done something kind for you? Like this isn't a trick question. It's a question. Well, my neighbor took a trash can in for me last week. Yeah. Didn't get quite get to about 12:00, but I get all your trash pick up and she I took care of it, Tom. You know, nice. Like kindness happens all the time, right? You just have and I think that's the intention behind the best day sticker which I get a chance to tell you is literally a copy of my father-in-law's license plate. It's a big idea. It says this is the best day of my life. And he would he would just leave these random voicemail messages or call us and say, "Hey, I just
013I'm on the back deck and I'm just looking at these geraniums and they're the brightest red and I just had to call and share that joy with you. Byebye." You know, just like that. And it's like, oh my gosh, you know, and so I think there's joy and kindness in life everywhere if you're intentionally looking for it. Um, but I get notes all the time and the most beautiful rainbow pictures you've ever seen in all the colors of the markers and just the wonder most wonderful love notes from my students. Um, and I love it so much. We have something at work which is a little bit similar in that it's an applause. you can send people plus points. So if they do something, you know, they helped you a little bit or they do
014something. Um you'll just get one of those randomly and it and it does it means a lot, right? Because they come not because you did some big project or it's because of something little that you did you helped them with or you made something a little bit easier and you just get this little applause and it's just a it's like a digital card that you they just said thank you for that. I don't know if you noticed recently, but if you ever go to Starbucks, they write little nice messages on your cups down. Little smiley, enjoy, smile. Yeah. If you talked about something, they reference that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, the whole idea of strong minds and kind hearts, it does leave a lasting footprint, but what it does is it I mean, it really
015cements our value that we place on strong academics and academic excellence because you saw that last night. I mean, you saw like almost if not over 900 kids graduate. I mean, isn't that amazing, J? That's incredible. They passed out all the diplomas. I love that. I know. It's pretty cool, huh? A lot of hand shaking. That is a lot of sweaty hands. Yeah. But what it does is it marries our commitment to strong academics with our strong commitment to social emotional learning and kindness. It marries the two in a way that creates a sense of belonging, a sense of connection so that kids can learn and thrive in an even more powerful way. And when all of you spoke about kindness, nothing you said cost any money at all. It was all free. card gesture.
016Taking somebody's trash cans in. That's legit. I mean, because otherwise they sit out in your driveway and people knock them over or whatever. I mean, that's that's a pretty nice neighbor there, Tom. That's what we're talking about tonight. We're talking about how we can leave a lasting footprint and really make this part of our culture and not a thing that we celebrate once a month as a character trait, but that it becomes embedded in how we do business. Part of the culture. Yeah. that were just kind and elephants are the heart behind this theme. When I talked to Jean about this, I said, "Hey, Gene, I think I'm going to use an elephant." And you were like, "I love it. I love it." Yeah. Uh because when they do walk together, they create this path.
017The big elephants create the path for the little elephants. And we did that last night. We created a path for our little elephants to cross the stage. And now they're going to become the big elephants that lead this community, that lead country. Last night I thought about kids when they graduated. Where are you guys going to go from here? You know, they've got colleges, plans, what can they be? So, yeah, that's they're moving on to the things where they take somebody interest. Yeah. And how cool would it be if they took this belief and this um culture of kindness with them and the footprint we leave they take with them to create new footprints other places. Yeah. everything we've done in our school but we've taught them what they've gained their hearts they will take
018that we help them create that themselves I think and you know we do so much with this already uh and I mean certainly we don't want to like create more work for people because kindness shouldn't be work it just should be how you believe and how you live your life um this morning um on one of the shows there was an elephant that was in the zoo and he some kind of a preserve and there was a little antelope that had fallen into the pond and he the elephant rescued the rescued the antelope and so you could just see it was trunk trying really hard to grab the antelope by the horn and pull it out and then it you know finally did but it was just it was so um you could see that
019for the elephant it was truly I mean they they were definitely trying to this wasn't a random act you know of just accidentally like hitting the elephant out of the pool or anything. It was I'm trying to grab your horn. I'm trying to pull you out. I'm trying to save you. And then afterwards, the elephant the analopee runs away. And um and the elephant kind of follows it to almost like it's checking on it. I It was And so when I saw this and I saw that our theme was elephants. I don't know. I just put that. That's great. Well, it's true that um this is what we create together because so JB set this up beautifully. Um what this herd right now is doing is they're protecting their little elephant. Um they are very
020fierce and loyal. They're compassionate. They're known for being um quite empathetic animals, but they're also fierce. They are great protectors of people and they they want to make sure that people feel that they're her feel safe just like we do. We want our kids to feel safe at school. We want them to feel like they have a sense of belonging and a sense of connection. And we do this together. I mean, I sent you all a text message this morning, not to set up this slide by any means, but we do lead this district together. We are the big elephants. And the big elephants do just this. We create a culture of safety and connection, belonging, community. That's our job. So that the little elephants can be little elephants and learn and grow and thrive.
021So why now? I know, right? one of our little elephants right there with the big elephant just like I mean we've seen he was amazing that one oh we've seen Simon grow up and last night was just very very powerful um why kindness and why now what I want you to realize is that this is this is completely connected and embedded in our strategic plan goal two we talk about social emotional learning in goal two but increases engagement and Jean feel free because you know this um better than I do. But like we talked about this a lot that it it does improve mental health. Um it strengthens school safety and it does it promotes all of that utility, resilience, belonging, everything we want kids to feel when they come to school. So why kindness?
022Why now? Why not? So here's what I'm going to talk to you about tonight. I'm not asking you to make any decisions, but I really want you to consider this proposal that we have in front of you. Um, I called it Sean Mutton's kind hearts. It's not nothing here is set in stone. Um, this was my best thinking at the time, uh, along with about four or five other people and Jean and I have met a few times and, um, but Jean's right. All of this goes together with you have all of these great sayings and one of these days I just want to capture them. But Jean says the more you connect the less you have to correct. And it's well, it's so true, especially if you've ever been a classroom teacher. But the
023more you connect with kids, the better relationship you build, the stronger connection you have, the more trust and your ability to teach is just um it's so much more powerful. That's Tony Greenley, one of our watch dogs at Bilj. He's a pretty great guy and he's just bis bumping out there with that with the paw. You know along with that L I think us being out there board members talking to people us bringing that forward everything we have communication with them we need this in schools talking about that in the heart what we're doing it would be very beneficial that way too to keep the strength of the thought going forwards a group well you know um like some people might say well what does this look like and really uh the possibilities are endless
024So, what I don't want you to do tonight is sit here and think about how to micromanage it, how to control it, but how to feed it and lead it in a way that is real and authentic. And there is that saying, what how do you eat the elephant? One bite at a time. Um because you don't you don't want to be have this become something that's overwhelming but something that gradually just becomes the culture and that when people say well what's it like in somebody like oh it's such a kind place to work or the kids would say that to each other because I mean god knows right now could all use a little more kindness in this world and why not us why why not our elephant herd so the possibility ities of
025this are endless or not. Maybe. Maybe. There you go. Did I Did I do that right, Michael? Did you skip one? I'm not sure. Okay. So, again, before we go forward, I just want to make sure because some people will think this is fluffy, but oh, kindness, it's a feel-good thing. Uh, it's more than a feel-good thing. It does maintain a really strong emphasis on our strategic plan and it highlights the important of importance of kindness and belonging and connection which you saw on full display last night. I mean I can't say it any more clearly. I'm afraid to get clicker. I'm warming it up for you. Uh so these are some ideas right so your mind some of you have already started thinking about really cool ideas but these are things that are either
026going on in our schools right now or they've become ideas you can do recognition activities events art these little art projects you'll see little kindness rocks in some of our schools that are so beautifully displayed and artistic have little kind messages and when you walk by you can't help but smile you know um you can have spirit days you can do service weeks kindness cards. Well, I tried to do a kindness tree here at central office, but people make fun of it. I helped put it together. Who's she looking at? It's an elementary thing, but it's right outside. It's on I had everybody write their name all heart kindness tree. I like it. Um, but you can really do anything anything that your I mean your your mind can think of to you might have
027to click. Sorry. It's very kind of you that. But when I thought about this, I thought, what about you? Like you are the big elephants. Um, and as elected leaders, I mean, you really do define uh what this district stands for. So why not have you consider, you know, championing this project? Because when you when you put your name behind it and when the board actually endorses it, it means something even more special and then the possibilities even grow. Um, at some point you might want to think about asking like the cities to join in. Maybe the county, maybe again we start small and we build if this is something that you really want to do. Um, ask local business owners, maybe um the mayor, maybe different departments get on board. It's it's different when
028the school board puts their stamp on it and says, "Here's where we're going. This is what we stand for. This is what we believe in. This is who we are." And that social emotional learning matters just as much as academics. I think us as a board, like you do a lot, Lori, videos, I think us the group should do a video. Let's talk about it. We're all united. What we want to do. No. Terrible. Sorry, that wasn't very kind. Show us something your kindness for doing it so they can make piece it all together. You're like you're all the way. It's like solution slayer, right? Well, I'm thinking how you going to start this off? We're going to talk about it. Bring it forward. We want the whole district, all the student know what we
029want to do and support it. That's from you and from us to all them. Yeah. And then fall behind us. Well, I got an expert here that's going to talk to you about that. Yeah, I just have a few more slides to get through. My mind's thinking over here. I know. And see, it will, right? And it's all about the good stuff and it's all about the right stuff. Uh, how do you measure it? You could probably find three or four different ways to measure this if you wanted to. You don't have to because again, everything I'm putting in front of you is just an idea, but you could track participation and recognition. And Jean's going to tell you how they counted all of their kindness um in his community. that we could have kids
030come every board meeting and share some celebrations. Um, and you have an incredibly gifted board member who is great at this work. Um, that's one of the reasons I asked him to come and partner with me as a new superintendent because he knows how to build culture. Um, and it'll be fun for you to do this together. But just to hear stories at board meetings would be so fun. We already do a lot of celebrations, but um, well, and we're going to build it this next year, right? Yeah. Yeah. So, here's um what we're thinking. Uh if you actually consider this as a um as a project, you're reviewing the proposal now. Ask you to like formally endorse it in July so that we can get a little team assembled um that can do some
031planning and how to start it, how to launch it. Um because we'd like to launch it at the August back to school events or convocation. Talk about it. Strong minds, kind hearts. Um, and then plan some monthly followup uh follow-up activities that again you might just want to plan something but let things also happen organically. Get ASB involved, get you know student leaders involved. Um, the possibilities are endless of how you want to approach this. So don't feel like you have to have a lockstep plan of everything. And Jean's going to reinforce this and tell you that. And sometimes you just let things happen even though maybe behind the scenes you do have a little bit of a plan but not too much structure because you have to remember that a kind culture isn't created
032overnight just like last night wasn't I mean it wasn't created in an hour and a half. We know that right? It's through one thoughtful action at a time. And it's where the big elephants teach the little elephants what kindness can do and the footprint it can leave. When I remember Bon Elementary School went there for that one time we get little stickers. Same means good there. Oh you did students. Did you do that here? Yeah. Do I know that I give that stick or something? Yeah. Oh that's cool. to get a talk. They talk about something and they get did good. They gave you the stickers. Remember that. And those were were smaller kids. It means a lot to them. Tommy, you were freaking me out there for a second. I'm like upstairs. Like Tommy
033got a tummy. I'll approve by you. But this is true about uh Ralph Aldo Emerson and uh really before I hand it over to Gene I just want you to remember this that we can't we can't do a kindness too soon because you never know how soon it will be too late right so Jean you want to talk to us about your project and how it went to okay absolutely but I'm not sure that Miss Booker will do we've got a good person to help me do well thanks so much I appreciate the chance to be here and I was in the community not too long ago and I just felt so warmly received I just want to say thank you to everybody. I was here a couple years ago doing workshops for the leadership
034team and absolutely had a fantastic time over the month. So I am like your biggest fan in the state. So people say all right enough about Senator Bonnie Lake, you know, kind of thing. But we're like no more more more. That's right. But I'm just really happy to be here tonight and happy to share a few ideas on kindness counseling and things we do. Kindness is not a weakness. Kindness is a strength. So let me start with that. And oftentimes we hear people say, "Well, it's weak to be kind. It's weak to be forgiving. It's weak." No, it's not. That's a strength. It's the opposite. Uh to be kind, to be thoughtful, to be sensitive to other people, to be empathetic is really a strong thing. Takes strength to do those kinds of things. So
035kindness is really a strength, not a weakness in life. Uh the research is really clear. I'll send an article I just got the other day about the importance of connection and engagement and the link to academic achievement. And you saw the quote I put up there. The more you connect, the less you have to correct and the better the students stay in school. And every educator in the room will agree with that. Everybody who's had a teacher that's connected with you will tell you the same thing. When I was that teacher, I would do anything for him or her because I knew they liked me. I knew they respected me. And one of the greatest things you can tell people at any age at all, you don't have to say it orally, but you have
036to say this. I see you. And when you say to somebody, I see you, you're saying to them, I I respect you. I know I don't know your full story, but I I'd like to hear your story at some point because everybody has a story. And when we say to people, I see you. That's the ultimate act of respect for somebody else. But too often we ignore people. We put people aside. We make assumptions about people that are almost always wrong and because we're assuming some things based upon our own culture and our own background, which is normally not a good way to do that. So connection matters, engagement matters. My first year of teaching in Olympia, Washington, second grade, I was uh two master teacher, open concept classroom, three second grades. I had 25,
03730 kids. So did Joe Edwards, so did Very big classroom there. These were two master teachers who had been teaching for a long time. And they were excellent teachers. I learned more in three years of teaching second grade from two master teachers than I could have learned in 30 years in a closed classroom because I would have been making the same mistakes over and over and over again. But because I had two master teachers that took the time to say if you did this, if you did that, if you if you went this way, it would work out for you. And so I I look back at my first three years as three of the most valuable years of my life. mentorship, induction, supporting people, sponsoring people. That's how we get great teachers going forward.
038We want we mentor honor monitor monitor them, sponsor them, etc. So anyway, the story is this boyfriends came to me one day. She's responsible for the quote. She said, "Jean, listen uh to this and it might help you later on. The more you connect with your students, the less you'll ever have to correct with them. So connect with them. That'll help you with connections." I said, "Great. Later on, uh Jober sets up something to me too. She said, "The best discipline in a classroom is an engaging curriculum. Engage your students in their own learning." And guess what happens? Fewer kids will ever go down to see their principal. I was a principal over in the Akima area. My I never saw students who are my best teachers. I never saw they didn't want to leave
039the classroom because they were so engaged in the learning and things that were going on. And all of you in this room will nod because you had a teacher that you thought I can't wait to have a teacher again. That's fantastic a lot. But we've also unfortunately had some folks that probably weren't there for some of the right reasons and we weren't quite as engaged as we might have been right there. So what we have in Senator Bonnie Lake who are my experience with your teachers is very very strong. You have a really high quality staff here really great people top to bottom. So very feel very fortunate about that. Um so let me talk to about a couple things how we got started. Uh it was uh December Christmas time of 2022. I got
040five people together uh who were friends in the community and when Washington is the five time five-time national winner of make a difference day I believe Texas is three with national awards. So one of my first calls was Margie Kerr. She and I co-chared make a difference day and went for 13 years and make a difference day is where we went out not just in October which is the actual day. We went out and we said let's make a difference every day. That was our theme for make a difference day. project after project after project after project. It worked really, really well. So, I got Morgan together, three other people, and I said, "You know what? I think we're allowing differences to divide us in our country. We have much more in common than we
041have differences. Kindness, thoughtfulness, generosity, compassion, empathy. Those are the values that we want to pass on to our kids. We want all of our students to graduate with those strong values to go forward and be productive citizens in our life. But as adults, if we don't model that, where do they get it?" Sadly, some of them don't need it at home. So, why don't we display those kind of values in a school setting of thoughtfulness and kindness and generosity? And they said, "Sher, that's a fantastic idea. What are we going to do?" I said, "Well, March 17th is National Make a Difference Day. Let's plan a big kickoff for March 17th and we'll just hit it hard." And they said, "What are you going to do?" I said we're going to get every mayor in
042the city, East Wanchi, Wanchi, India, Lake Shalan, Moses Lake to do a proclamation recognizing March 17th as excuse me, February 17th as national make a difference day. They said, "Sure, it'll never happen." We got them all. We attended every one of the mayor's meetings, the council meetings. You think a mayor is not going to sign a proclamation make we want our community to be make a different or you know, not make a difference today, but a kindest community. They all got on board really quickly. Then we launched it. Okay, we said our what's our goal? Our goal is going to be let's do 2023 acts of kindness in 2023. Oh, it'll never happen. Never happened. We had those done within two months. One elementary school took off right away and did 1,400 happy letters in
043the first month of the whole thing. So, we were halfway there before even got started. So, we just snowballed. I've told Lori this a couple times and present on the phone. This has to be yours. I'll share some things we did but don't you know replication is not probably a great idea because you got to come up with your own things that are contextual. Does that make sense you guys? So I want to share what we did. This thing snowballed at the end of when we were going to do one year at the end of this we would never have thought all those things would have occurred because they became organic from the students from the principles from the parents from the faith community. Everybody got involved. Every single person got involved. We are never
044turned down for a fundraiser or for any support going going forward. Um, so I'm going to digress for a second. We just did a thing la two Saturdays ago. One of the clubs that got started was a random acts of kindness club at the high school. Over 1670 kids at Wanchachi High School are involved in random acts of kindness. I'll share with you some of the things they did. We just did a thing for elementary kids two Saturdays ago where they and their parents came and we had an entire day of doing acts of kindness around the community. And so the kids raised a little money and everybody who came got one of this. These are just some of the sponsors. We never got turned down by a sponsor and you won't either. You go
045to somebody and say, you know, we're doing in summer lake. What do you think? They'll be right there behind you. So I brought a t-shirt. The student said to me, can we give all the board members a t-shirt? This is from the random acts of high news club at the high school. I high school you guys. And so for those of you that are here, I have more over here. Okay. So, please take some. Yeah. Okay. You got one. Good. Brian Brian took six. So, anyway, this is for the kids and and we're going to get a picture at the end. Okay. Because they I told them they're excited about me seeing them next week about that was nice of them. Yeah, they're very thoughtful kids. They're really, really, really nice kids. And I see
046them around town all the time and they always are very generous about talking about the things they're doing. Well, let's talk a little bit about this is my favorite one of my favorite sayings in the world right here. Oh, okay. I'll try this and see if it will work. Okay, it's gone. You might have to do it for me. Okay. Uh when you change the way you look at things, keep going, the things you look at change. And that's probably uh one of my core beliefs in life too. We when we change the lens on what we're looking at, we see goodness and kindness and thoughtfulness. It's there. It's everywhere. And I often tell the audience if I want you to go out for 20 minutes and I want you to come back with everybody
047with an act of kindness that you saw and everybody will come back with that. But if I also sent them out and said I want you to come back with something that was anger and frustration and denial or whatever they would also come back with that too. In life we find what we look for you guys. We really do. If you look for goodness and kindness it's everywhere. But you also have to look for how you can be thoughtful and kind and good as well too because we have to set the example as adults and parents going forward. I would tell my teacher when I was a principal all the time, I want you to be a great content person. I want you to deliver great content, but mostly I want you to be a
048great role model. Want you to be the kind of person you want your kids to be because they will not remember the fifth grade textbook. They will remember the eighth grade math book, but they'll remember how you treated them. they'll always remember that going forward. And so it's important, I think. So I, this is my thing in life. I look at something and I try to find the good in it. Trying to find the kindness in it. We have a 5-year-old and a 2-year-old granddaughter. And it's very important for me that when I'm around them that I am kind and gracious to the things they do as well. Uh this is a group we started with five and I the next meeting I said, I want you to bring one other person to the next
049meeting. And this was this is how we we got started. And people came and they said, "Sher, this is a great idea." went around the room and talked about what we're going to do for kindness. We started with this group and at the end we had over 175 people on committees working on kindness. It just grew organically. We met every other Thursday in a room at at a foundation. They gave us a free room for it right there. We were not a 501c3. We didn't raise any money or anything. We had no bylaws and stuff like that. It was simply come on and it was great. Talk about kindness. That's right. just come on in and talk about kindness and what we're going to do and how we can support you. So, it went really
050great. Our teacher associations were fantastic and they got very very deeply involved in that as well. Uh this is a little flyer. You'll see it a little bit later in a couple things. And our newspapers had shar all over them. And I said, "What would you like?" They said, "What would you like us to do?" I said, "I'd like you to put a kindness thing every week in the paper." Well, how are we going to get them? Well, you go. We'll put a website out. People can submit their act of kindness on there. The newspaper will select those and do every week an act of kindness on there. It was always in front of people constantly. Newspaper all free, no problem at all. We had a banner company that said, "We'll make your banners for
051you." And they had about $2,000 a pop and they made all of our banners for free, too. So, we didn't have to go out and worry about collecting the money. We had people that came forward and said, "We want to be part of this." It'll happen in your community, too. Once the word gets out, people will say, "H how do we participate? We want to be part of this as well." And so the the students, we asked the students to draw a logo. This came from, I think, a third grade student. Be kind thing right there. Join the movement. You can see we have a QR code down there. We go to the website. The website, you can go to that website down there. And you can still see some of the things are on
052there. But we had NCWTV Life on there. We had radio stations. Our paper was on there. Uh we have foundations on there and others that joined and sponsored the things that we did. That's came through the third grader. our little thing. You'll see a little bit later that we were in parades all the time. We're in the Alpha Blossom Parade. I'll tell you about that a little bit later. Uh we're also in the world's shortest parade. We have a St. Patrick's Day parade in Wanchi that's a half a block long. It goes down a Rondo Street. It can't be more than 300 feet, honestly. And our former mayor was from Ireland and he got it started all the time and he said, "Sher, shortest parade in the world. Half a block." It was. We have
053like 60 entries. They turn a corner and they're done. I mean that is true story. It's like amazing. So anyway, we for that which I looked at a little bit later was we wanted to do what what's our purpose because we were going to ask that all the time to talk to people was to inspire uh contribute and recognize absence of kindness. That's what we wanted to do and that should be in your packet there as well. And we said let's define kindness then. What's the quality of being friendly, generous and considered? We don't have two paragraphs to these things. Simplicity, you know, just simplicity that you can remember and do those kind of things. Uh we're only as strong as we're united, only as weak as we're divided. Came from one of the members
054of our group. Let's not divide. Let's combine and be strong in the things that we do. Okay? Let's unite around common values, kindness, thought, and civil. There are the cities that jumped in right away. East Wanchi, Wanchi, Kashmir, Lake Chalan, Moses Lake and four four or five others joined in that little bit later on. There's our gold and then finally uh we've developed a lot of squad. These came forward at middle schools that come forward and develop what we call hope squads and those are groups of students at the u middle school level that want to do random acts of kindness etc. It's not um um surprising to you that we have an epidemic of loneliness in this country and it's it's on both ends of the curve. It's among students and the older generation
055of folks and it's an epidemic. We have people that are lonely and kindness is some way we can get to that. So, we did a lot of work senior citizen, a lot of work with our youth and those kinds of things. I'll tell you more stories about that. But we have a senior uh what's called a senior center over there. is called the senior activity center now and we uh we grow is there 80 members a month are gandering in that senior center over there that's a big big area and then I asked the director a while back I said well super how many are leaving he said about 15 or so what's the reason they're leaving no connection they come there to be get why do they come there they come there to get
056connected don't they don't come there for the lunch they come there to find connection and when nobody connects with them they don't come So connection matters at all levels like that and particularly at school. And all the teachers in here and all the educators in here know that the kids we fail to talk to are the kids that uh don't really capture our attention most often. They're the silent kids. They're the ones that walk down the hallway. They're the ones behind the door. They're the kids that we have to talk to. The ones that we really have to reach out and connect. We connect with the kids that are popular and do a lot of things. But the kids that we really need to connect with, the lonely kids are ones that we really need
057to connect with. It's not lost in any of you that loneliness and lack of connection as the number one predictor of school violence. Kids don't feel connected. They feel disconnected to school. So, we're going to take that out general terms of the other population. The more we can connect, act of kindness, the more we can build their culture, the more we can identify with your strategic plan, more academic academically well they'll do, the more they participate in activities, etc. So that should work out good. This is a example of a proclamation right here and this is from our mayor. Frank's no longer the mayor, but this was a proclamation that Frank did. It should be in your packet as well. And I can give you lots of proclamations for the county or the city or
058whatever. So, if you decide to do a proclamation or you decide to get to the ask the mayor to do one, there's a sample there for you to do that. Uh, a couple signs of of our schools that went up there. John Newberry kind was free u to give but priceless to receive and Cascade Christian Academy be friendly. U make someone stay. So, all over the signage went up all over town. So all over Wanchi, East Wanche, Moses Lake, India, Lake Shalan, Manson were signs that went up around kindness. So keep it going. This is a hope squad at Morgan Owens Elementary Lake school district and I talk to those group those kids all the time. Well, if you want to get middle school kids excited given activity like kindness, there are a thousand ideas
059about how those kids can be kind and they absolutely love it, you know. And again, our teachers really stepped forward and were really very helpful in that regard. This is Veil Elementary School in Cashmere. And this is a school where those kids, 1400 happy letters, which I'll talk about in the first month. 14 happy letters, you know, that first month. Got it done. And those kids were so excited. There's one of our banners. Those are all free given to us by a local banner shop guy. He said, "Shar, this is so and so. I'm in cashmere. I hear what you're doing. I'll do all your banners for free for you." So we never have to pay for a banner and we probably have 20 banners all over town. They're still hanging around town. People say,
060"Are you gonna come collect that banner? Are you kidding? Leave it up." You know, and so one of the banners was in the Wanche School District boardroom. That's still up there. One was in East Wanche boardroom, too. So the superintendent kept the banners up there. There's our website down below. Kindness counts NCW stands for North Central Washington because we were all over the area there as well. Uh we got a call from Lake Stevens School District who heard about what we were doing and they said sure we want to do this too and so they sent us a picture of their elementary kids starting the kindness at at their particular school as well. So spread pretty much this is a random acts of kindness one of activities called warm hat warm heads hands and feet
061and that's a little drive that they did and these were giving uh to uh homeless people in town and you know the high school kids are collecting these. We got big bins that people are donating gloves and hats and socks and everything and the kids go down to one of our resource centers down there where we have a lot of homeless folks and they give these out all the time. So, we're making the connection between the student and these other populations of people they don't typically see right there as well. Uh, high school got I mentioned got really involved. This is one of their activities chalkwalk. So after every like Christmas or holiday, the kids go out there and they write, "Welcome. Love to have you. Great to be back in school." And that's what
062just one of their activities that they do. This random acts of kindness club at the high school is on fire. They've got activities all the time. And this is one of the things that they do there. They put on teachers cars at on Friday. Had a great week. Thank you so much. See you on Monday. You know, all kinds of things like that. These are not ideas that we gave them. These ideas came from the kids. And that's the best part. and they're they're deciding what kindness looks like at their place right there. Um this is a packing up of the warm hats and and feet and things right there. That's the we had an evening where we put all together the packages and the kids would go down the next couple of days and
063put all those things together there as well. So just an activity there. Uh you guys I think are character strong. Use character strong. Yeah. and kindness is part of that and there's a a piece that is part of your program already with character strong and the the originator of this is a student from Washi High School. Yeah. So his mother was on the school board over there for a long time. Yeah. So and churches got involved. This is Kashmir Community Church and they kept the if you go to Kashmir and the sign is still there three years later. You go right through the middle of Kashmir and you see the sign right on the church right there. They got so excited that every Thursday night they have a free dinner for every community person who
064needs a meal. Every Thursday night, first Thursday, Lion Lions buy the food. Next Thursday, Rotary buys the food. Next Thursday, that club buys the food that buys the food. And but the the kindness group in and Casher has got kept us going for these many years. Every Thursday night. So, and I've been to several of them and it's just warm when the people come in. You don't see these people generally on the street, but they're homeless and they're without food and they bring their families and they get a free meal. And for many of those families, it's the only good meal they get, you know, to that rate. So, it's a lot of the church has got faith community got really involved. This is uh we just finished we were in the uh parade uh
065the Apple Boston parade and we're just taking down the set. There's a truck there and we were had a little activity where pretending like we were building something. It's let's build communities of kindness was our theme up there right there. And you can see those are some of the people that were helping on the float and different things like that. And so um we got third place. Uh and so I I asked the festival director, "How many people in our category?" Three. I said, "What? You could have said 30." No, he said only three. Thanks a lot. But we got a trophy. a little tiny co really made us feel good there. Our law enforcement folks really got involved in this thing. Oh my gosh, they just went head over heels over this thing. Same
066with the fire EMTs, everybody. We collected teddy bears for a while. They had over 125 teddy bears collected on a weekend and they went to ambulance folks and stuff like that. Goes to a house where there's trauma and they get a little guy or gal teddy bear. So those kind of thing. Uh these folks, he's got a happy letter right there. One of the kids, they gave out little happy things for free. this, free that. And our uh local police department went head over heels with this thing. They just really got involved in it because they wanted to have the image of kindness and and thoughtfulness and stuff like that. So, it was really great work they did. Oops. I'll go back a little bit here. Go back one. Okay, there we go. This is
067East Wash Police Department and they're out there playing basketball with the kids during the day and they're giving them some water slide tickets to go up to a Shell Shalan water slide thing up there. That's cool. Yeah, those kids love it. Absolutely. You know, and the relationship you have with your law enforcement now is so good, isn't it? And it's one of it's one of caring and relationship and kindness and thoughtfulness and not just going out to get bad guy necessarily. And the next one, next slide there. And this is a an example of an article in the paper once a week when Auntie World drew up an article. Didn't cost us to send you guys. You can imagine over a year how much that would have cost if we would have had to pay
068for that thing. But and where did they get this? They got this from people submitting their act of kindness to the website. The Wachi World pulled the ones out of it and put it up there for us. We didn't have to do that kind of work there. So, this is the officers of East Wanche. Then there's the veteran officers shoot with hoops and down at the bottom was a century old birthday there party we had for that. So, um all we had to do is submit it or people had to submit it and we would get just hundreds and hundreds of submissions about acts of kindness that were going on in the community. Okay. The next one, this this is chip for duck. We got to say, how is Sher gonna make a story out
069of this? Well, I will. So, we have link transit over there. And link transit uh all all bus ridership in uh throughout North Central Washington is free. There's no charge to ride a bus over there. Half of the fleet is electric. So, it's great. We don't have to worry about turn styles. We don't have to worry about fairs, you know, like that. It's really nice. It's all free. And so one of the routes goes up to Manson, which is just above Chalan, of course. And so the bus driver was going up there one day. This is his story. And he went to turn around and he noticed a duck in the water had a lure in the duck's mouth that were keeping the duck's beak from opening up. The duck kept on him. So he
070jumps down there and grabs the duck and pulls the duck up and pulls the lure out, but breaks part of the beak, you know, not enough where the duck can't eat, but breaks it, you know. So it puts the duck back close up. Twice a day the bus goes to Manson. Who greetss the bus twice a day? No. The duck. Serious. The duck. Oh my gosh. The bus comes around the corner. Duck waddles up there. Bus driver opens the door. What does the duck do? Gets on the bus, walks down the bus, walks around, goes back out. The bus driver always has a little food for the bus. And so they decided, they didn't have a logo at that time. They decided to share it. We're all over this kind of acts of kindness thing.
071The transic system is they said we're going to put we're going to make Chip the duck our mask on as an act of kindness. Isn't that cool? So if you go to you go to Shalam, you see a bus with Chip the Duck, it all came out of random acts of Is that a good story? So another driver told me another story because I went to visit him one time and I said, "Any other drivers have a story?" He said, "Yeah, I got a story, Gene." I said, "What happened?" He said, "I drive up by Walmart, you know, and so I drove up there and they had a about only seven or eight people in the bus and summer looked a little for Lauren. So I noticed the Girl Scouts were telling cookies. So I
072went over and bought a box of all my passengers of cookies. And he said, "You thought I'd give them $100 bill, but all I did was give everyone a Girl Scout box of cookies, you know, and they thought I was the best bus driver ever." And he said, "It didn't cost me a lot of money, but it was just the kindest act that you could do." So, you see how these things are just organic, you know, how they work like that. That really good uh cleanup, random acts of kindness. We did a lot a lot of cleanups projects over there all the time and that was something everybody really enjoyed. Thank you. Okay. And there's we did a shredded on a Saturday. We do about four of those a year where we just bring in
073a machine and people come and shred things for free. Just a random act of kindness. Again, the company donated it for free. So, pretty easy to do. Okay, next one there. And this is uh right here happy letters. I'm going to walk you through those in just a second. This was started by a person in our community who said, you know, it doesn't have to be much, but I'm going to create a little form and I'm going to make sure we start the elementary level and kids can u go ahead and do these and we'll give them to senior centers at senior center activity center oncology patients. You can see how all these go, you know, stuff like that. So, it worked really really good. Okay. Okay. And then the next one here, we have
074a group in town called Glad Song. And they are a group of uh of adults, singing group, choir group, and they will for any nonprofit sing for free for any fundraiser. And that they took us on as one of their efforts. And so every time they did a fundraiser, the proceeds went to um um a woman's shelter or a child charity in town and through the random acts of kindness at the high school. Again, this group just stepped up and said, "We want to do this for you." You know, and we didn't have to even have to ask them to do that. Okay. Uh art park in the summer. All summer long, every other week, we had a group of artists who would go to our parks and they would probably all the materials for
075all the kids to an art park and their parents too like that. The kids were great. We couldn't get their parents to leave. I'm not finished with my art project yet. Okay, next one. Um this is uh some of you have heard me talk about this book. Have you filled a bucket today? It's a really good little book for elementary kids, a guide to daily happiness for kids. And really what it's about, it's about two questions that my son and his wife ask our 5-year-old granddaughter every night. Did you fill someone's bucket today with an act of kindness, and if so, what did you do? You know, and she goes to bed every night with that in her mind. You know, 5-year-old girl every night she goes to sleep saying, "Today I fill somebody's bucket
076of kindness by doing this activity." Isn't that nice? That's what the book's about. It's a really good book if you have grandkids or younger kids. Okay, next one there. Okay. And that's our website and we'll keep going here a little bit and I want to walk you through this packet very quickly and then I'll answer a couple questions you might have. The first one is just all the information I mentioned here and you can see on this one here all of our various sponsors down here, radio stations, you know, TV station, newspapers. The next one is a proclamation map there for you and we have copies for that. The next one is just another one of the articles in the paper that we did. Random acts of kindness there. And the next thing should be
077your happy letters right there. Is that in here for you? And uh Tracy uh I said Tracy, can you put a packet together for me? And so here are the some information about Tracy and the work that she does with her card and then examples of that and then little things that she had put in there as well. And when I go to senior centers or to the hospital or whatever to visit up there, I will often see these letters taped on patients walls on their doors because how many people up there don't ever hear from anybody and I hear they got a happy letter from somebody in the elementary kids to live with. So I mean it's such a simple thing. It doesn't take much to do a small thing and it really makes
078a big difference. And so Tracy's just going to say now in that regard. Rainbow. Uhhuh. And another group that we got involved with, I'm watching my time quickly here because I want to do some time for question is a group called Only Seven Seconds. And so u which is north of us as you know up there above Chalan small community and there was a family there. Both the boys were very good athletes. Their home was the center of the university around Peter High School. athletes with really really nice kids etc. And the older boy graduated went off and then the younger boy about four years younger when he's a sophomore developed a a really tough disease and really didn't look like he was going to make it. So um for eight weeks he was in
079bed at home pretty much by himself and during that time being one of the most popular kids in high school none of his friends ever connected with him. No one called, no one texted him, no one came over, no one did anything. He became extremely depressed and near suicidal because no one was connecting with him. And his mother said, "You know, it would have only taken 7 seconds for someone to connect with my son." 7 seconds, a text, an email, a phone call, a stop by, stop by my house. But nobody did it. And she almost lost her son because of the lack of connection. And so she said, "I got to start a nonprofit called Only Seven Seconds where we've got to end loneliness. That's their mission. I've done their strategic platform and their
080mission is to end loneliness among youth and so they do a fabulous job. They have presentations on that how kids can connect and build relationships etc. And it's yeah it's called only 7 seconds. If you have a chance to Google only 7 seconds you'll see some of the work that they're doing. It's very profound work and it really is saving a lot of lives for a lot of kids who are getting near the end of the road and I know how can we help connect with them. Oh, go see him. Take him somewhere. I mean, it's it's it doesn't cost anything to be kind to you guys. It's contagious. It's just a small thing to push a cart back to say good morning, to say hello like that. And uh some of you are experiencing
081what I'm experiencing too now. Sometimes you walk down the you come into somebody, you say good morning and then I something wrong with this guy and but I'm going to keep doing it, you know, because it's important to lift people's spirits up and to be thoughtful and be kind as you go forward. So only seven seconds, etc. And final thing I'll tell you, you some of you know Cooper Hartley. You guys know anybody know Cooper here? No. Um we're Carol and I are coming over to his graduation party. uh upcoming here on July 12th. Uh his mother, Lesie, teacher. Yeah. Daffodil. Uh I married Lesie and her husband. That's right. Yeah. Small world, not about 19 years ago. Yeah. Yeah. I have a minister's license and so I do weddings and eulogies and stuff like
082that. And uh anyway, she taught with my wife Carol Lesley did. That's how I knew her. She came to me and she said, "Would you do my marriage?" I said, "I'd be happy to. you have somebody in mind? I said, I'll do a ceremony, but I don't really actually find the people doing it. She said, 'Of course I do have somebody in mind. And so anyway, that was an interesting wedding because it was in Ellisburg near the old Anderson branch there. And Tony, my husband was so nervous. He said to me, Jean, I can't say anything. I can't say a word. I said, you got at least say I do. I can I can get I do up. I said, that's good, Tony. He said, "But that's all I'm going to say." I said, "Well,
083okay." And that's all I said. Have to ask Leslie. She said, "Oh, yeah. I mean, so to see do it." But anyway, so Carol and I got what got a graduation thing. So we're going to come over to Cooper's party on July 12th, a proud graduate of your school district here and going on to play basketball in a community college. So isn't that funny how it runs full circle? You guys like that all of a sudden there. So that's great. Um, so thank you. I'm happy to help any way that can as you know and I went through this really quickly. Started small, it grew organically and please let it grow and let yours grow too and let your kids decide what acts of kindness look like in your community and it'll be yours. So
084that that would be the important part right there. But I just want to say thank you Lori for having me too. Thank you guys and all the others here. I really appreciate the chance to be here and I'm going to have a great drive home tonight doing two presentations tomorrow. then back to the tomorrow. But it's okay because I'll be thinking of kindness and and my sticker. Right there. Yeah, that's great. Thank you so much. But thank you all. I really appreciate it. If I can answer any questions, I'd be happy to do that either now or later or email or whatever. So, thank you. Really appreciate you guys tonight. You're a lot of great ideas. Thank you very much. Oh, you're welcome. Thank you. It's all going. So, I think tonight what I just
085need to know from you is are you wanting to go in this direction um so that we could bring you a formal like um like a action item to endorse this kindness work for however long you want to do it. But because again, no decisions tonight, but hopefully we piqu your interest and like it got like it maybe the wheels are spinning. I think the wheels are spinning back there. Uh and maybe over here and maybe everybody can help as well. But um so thumbs up, thumbs down, sideways. That's great. So I'm gonna Thomas know. So John Norland taught a little. Oh, really? And and we started basically the structure for car character strong came from Wachi High School with the most amazing teacher he had there. Yes. Yes. I'm a thumbs up if we
086do something. Yeah, here's what I don't I thumbs down emphatically. We as a board just say here's a proclamation and it's all words and it's not due. You know, one of the kids some of the stuff that happens is so amazing. I had a young lady who as a senior every single day went and picked up a freshman who came from a hallway and uh she said my job is to get her to graduate. And they asked her why and she said because this is what the adults did for me. pretty cool. But it was all about doing. It wasn't, you know, from John to the rest of us. It was uh what do we want to do and how do we want to borrow this? And so there was no speeches about the first
087day. There was no lots of posters or things like that. It started off with what are we intentionally doing as adults to do this? And it was funny because uh one of the kids at some point said, "This feels like a place where you guys want us to be, not where we have to come to school." And that really became kind of our theme. So what could we do? And I know we still have people working. We have that. I think there's there's tons of that. But what I saw in that process is if we had just talked about it, never would have started. Right. Right. And it's continuing on and on and on. And Bonnie Lake High School is doing it. Different terminologies. They've got power in that, but their teachers live it and
088the kids join it because they see it. They don't hear it. And that that's important difference. Yeah. Well, and I would say one thing too is that there are some organic things. I mean, there's a lot of things I'm like, "Oh, it's already happening. Sorry happen." And I would hate for someone to stop what they're doing thinking that it wasn't part of this, right? or or that they had to change what was working to make it part of something. So, just something kind of to think about too. How does how do they know that what they're already doing if it's just part of it or it's not a new initiative? It's just a different way to continue instruction. Make it explicit. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. The schools jump right on top of that too, Bill. Over
089there, the board had presentations regularly, the principles did, and recognition. It really was organic from the kids. That was the best part. What it was amazing what one of the things that uh I don't know was a student who felt bad for the custodians. Oh yeah. They always had these things. Yeah. So it was students came to me and said we want to trash out all the rooms on a Friday. So the custodians that's the last thing they have to worry about. And uh so I said okay where are we going to be? I did it with them. And first of all the kids are like what are you doing with garbage cans? Yeah. That's what we do, right? That's what we're going to do. Um it was amazing because the custodians came out and
090they were tears. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly right. Yeah. That friendship is incredible, isn't it? Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. We have a lot of things where the kids now doing things for bus riders, you know, for that reason. And some of this us finding out what the kids are already doing because they're doing amazing things. Yeah. Amazing. Well, you'll be shocked if you sit in some of those random acts of kindness or hope squads and the kids are generating ideas. You've got to put a time limit on. They're just exploding with ideas there, too. Yeah. Just great. You bet. Can I have one more? Can I do one more thing? I forgot this. We have a We started when I was at the a book every year on teachers make a difference. And we had uh students
091write about teachers who made a difference in their lives, you know, and it just very very popular. and the students wrote about that. It was just fantastic. Very emotional kind of thing. And so, um, we have 23 books now since I left ESD. And, uh, we just did one recently called Kindness Counts. And it was about students who wrote a story about a teacher who did a random act of kindness that changed their life. This will break your heart. I mean, this will make you bring tears to your eyes right here because these students are saying, "This teacher did something for me unbeknownst to me. I didn't know that she knew this about this and it changed my whole life. And so that with this this this our this book is called kindness counts. Teacher
092made a difference in my life kind of thing. Really a pretty neat little thing right there. So and I did the forward and the reason I bring it up because I put that in your packet. The last thing in your packet is the forward that I wrote in there about Elden Walt who does it. He said, "Can you write the forward?" Thank you. So that's kind of a synopsis of what we did. Thanks, J. Thank you. I think to what Bill was talking about, too, we have such a solid strategic plan that has solid pillars and has layers from the top to the bottom on how to actually execute, track, and continue improving. So I think if we can start at that level as well and then work down to the building level, it should
093disseminate out but in a way that works in conjunction with what they're already doing instead of trying to put the brakes on it and change and as you were saying and and try to maybe figure out how to just thread it together and I bet if we ask the students they'll figure it out. Yeah. So again, just looking looking for some direction on what to bring you in July. Good. Yeah. Okay. Sounds like a good idea. I think it'll be fun. A lot we can do in convocation. I can't wait to see how you dress up for that. The queen of kindness. Oh, interesting. Their mind's going now. That's right. But Dean, what you're talking about, you're talking about leaving footprints. Yeah. Exactly right. Yeah. And that's Yeah. These kids will will thank you for
094this opportunity and then look back on their high school experience. Not just what they learned, but what they saw and what they saw. You as adults pave the way. That's leadership. We need to take a picture with these for your Oh, yeah. I can't. Oh, you guys got to get a picture because the students asked me to get a picture. Bring back. So if you could line up discussion, it's a later quote. I was just hold it in the district didn't have air conditioning that actually worked. Have more discussions while we're doing the t-shirt wardrobe changes. Is there any more discussion for tonight? Looks good. We had a really great great evening last night that we're all just still still buzzing from and but anything. Yeah. A little Yeah, they can wear it to hold
095it and we'll get a picture and any thing anybody wanted to bring up or topics to discuss. They were amazing. I mean it was it was you know congratulations. They're all thanking you. A few sers which I still take frankly think a few man I promise I've done anything. But you're did just such a tremendous job and the email or the text I sent. I mean this I don't know people who don't do this realize. I mean you're you're trying to graduate seniors who literally will come up day before saying I'm not passing this class. what do you what can you do for me? You've got the other ones who are doing finals and such. You've you're registering for next year. You're doing all that and you're putting on the most This is what I
096told my staff and and actually we told the kids this is the most public thing we'll ever do as a school. So, we kids you guys are actually just the actresses people in the in here, but they're all looking at what you do. And it's amazing how I could pull them together, but for the for the staffs to be able to do what they're doing and they got to be dog tired right now. It's it's just an amazing evening that I wish all the adults that came actually could see all those components coming together because it's it's amazing. But it's so it's so cool to see how I I was thinking about and talking to my husband about the fact that I'm like it's it's you know didn't do anything and and sat there and
097was fortunate enough to be able to you know shake these hands and hand out these diplomas but how proud I was of our the community, the students, the staff, the just the presence to be able to be there and feel you know such pride at at what had culminated there. Um cuz I imagine that that would be a situation where it wasn't where it wasn't being done with the respect that that moment deserves. And so yeah, so you just tell when they're coming up the stairs, some of them are just so nervous and there this random board member they like, who's this person? like they know all of the principles and the staff that are sitting around and we're you know these faces that they have really probably never interacted a ton with. Um I
098tried something different this year instead of just a congratulations congratulations congratulations a thousand times. It's your stole. Yeah. you know, it was it was like, I love your hat, you know, or or that's a really cool stool you're wearing. And like you could just feel them because of course you're holding their hand as and you could just feel them like relax and just a smile. And so it it really the kindness talking about was like just that little bit of a compliment just totally changed their demeanor, right? And I was it was very hopeful for me because I know the parents are going to be looking that for that picture. You know, they're going to be scouring the website as soon as it comes out to see their student's picture. And if you just have
099this student that's just stiff and nervous, you know, that's not the best momentum. So, it just it relaxed them and I thought it was it was really cool. One of the coolest things too and I didn't do it this year but when I was in the building and when I was over here is you know when they're line getting lined up starting that is just walk down through the energy and stuff and hear some of the stories and kids you know congratulating on each other and stuff. I mean that's just I tried really hard to listen to their names be called so I could say Lori congratulations and they were like I don't know you but I did too. That's a good idea. Yeah, I did too. And there and I was on a roll
100for a little while on one side where I could really hear it and then I just couldn't it the way it was actually easier when they were on stage. It was right there and happening. Yeah. Yeah. I did the same thing. That was a really good idea. I think that just want to give Dave's crew a big shout out for making Eli Hill happen. Yeah. Yeah. Um, thank I know that I know the tents are really not the like the most enjoyable thing for you to put up, but we appreciated it more than you could more than you know. I know it's tough and it takes a long time and it's um it's hard to put those tents up, but thank you. It was like a safety thing because it was I mean so well
101we've had years where the tents have tried to go away. So having those big when I showed up and saw those big concrete acres I was like oh this is great and a big thanks to Pam. I mean your whole campus up there but uh for or like helping organize the victory tour. I mean because our almost big elephants went through the little elephants and I mean if you think about this I really want you to think about this elephant symbolism because I'm going to bring it back and back and back. Think about that. They're high-fiving and they're giving flowers and all. I mean, these kids are like they're looking up to them like Cooper Heartley. Oh, yeah. I mean, he's like six foot, I don't know, 10 anyway, but they just look up to
102these kids. Um, so major thanks to Pam for that. All the kids going through the building there as I was there upstairs from the front door and going down the hallway and stuff, victory tour and stuff. That was amazing. Yeah. And Brian, thanks for being there last night. Michael, thank you for being there last night. I mean lot of and our resident mom was there last night. We were taking pictures. So you should have seen yourself. You're just like so proud. Anyway, thanks Dave. Yeah. Great presentation, good conversation. Um if there's not anything else, I will juris and we can take a picture. Yay. Good. Good. All right. Our journey.