A few Fridays a month, I get to school a little early to meet with our No Place for Hate student leaders. This dedicated group of nine fourth and fifth graders gets to school at 7:30 am to plan activities to help make our school a more inclusive and kind place. I lead this group with my friend Ashley and we couldn’t be luckier with the group of kids that signed up for this important work.

Last Friday morning, the group was recording videos they planned sharing different ways to be an ally. These videos will be shared on our morning news broadcast. These group also created a poster that will be displayed and today, when they were done recording, they worked on creating images for the poster. When I tell you that these kids take the work seriously, I mean it. Their empathetic hearts just ooze as we brainstorm, discuss, and get to work.

Today, as L was working on her poster image, she turned to Ashley and I. “What if we did a No Place for Hate Rise and Read and did a read aloud.” Rise and Reads are where kids come to school early, with their families, to read together. We let L know that a Rise and Read would be a great idea.

“We’d have to find a good book,” I said, looking at Ashley with “this kid is amazing” eyes.

“I have one,” L said letting us know she had really been thinking about this. “The Invisible String. We could talk about how we’re all connected.”

Sold. During our next meeting, we will pitch L’s idea to the rest of the group and begin planning our next activity.

These meetings fill me with hope for the future. These kids genuinely want to make our school a better place. There is no doubt in my mind that they’ll go forward doing all they can to make the world a better place.

Where in the world am I writing from: I’m sitting in front of my dead laptop, typing on my phone!