Ripple effect: Here’s how JoCo students showed kindness during SevenDays week

The motto for the SevenDays movement is “Make a ripple, change the world,” and that’s just what the recipients of the Kindness Action Scholarship have been doing in the metro.

The five winners submitted essays about projects they had done that spread ripples of kindness in their respective communities. They received $1,000 toward their continued education.

It’s been seven or eight years since the scholarship started, according to Jill Andersen, director of SevenDays.

“The kindness scholarship is something that is integral to what we do. It’s us asking students to start being the ripple makers instead of us just teaching,” Andersen said. “It’s putting them in charge of kindness. It’s kind of handing the baton off to the next generation.”

At least five representatives from different parts of the community judge all the applications. The kindness projects don’t have to have been done in the past year, but applicants must be high school seniors.

It also can’t just be doing something nice for people — there has to be some sort of ripple effect, like a chain of action that keeps going.

“I’m impressed every year by the winners. They all have amazing projects. What is impressive to me is that these are students, and the students are affecting other students to do the same thing, which is really important,” Andersen said.

The number of applications year to year has ranged from 50 to five. It’s been fewer the last couple of years because doing projects involving lots of people is obviously difficult in a pandemic.

Andersen said that with kids spending more time at home and less in the classroom, the word hasn’t gotten out about the scholarship as much as they’d like. Although Andersen has received applications from other states, the scholarship is really focused on students and projects in the Kansas City metro area.

Blue Valley Northwest student Evan Clark did his project as a freshman in 2018 as part of his work toward becoming an Eagle Scout. He taught 20 younger scouts how to do origami and positive ways to interact with seniors. Then, he brought the whole group over to Rose Estates assisted living in Overland Park, where they all taught seniors to do origami.

“Middle school and high school boys don’t go out of their way to interact with seniors. This is really nice for all these young men to learn about what these seniors went through (in life),” Evan said. “Origami was just the vessel for human connection. Conversations, smiles and laughter as a result of making origami was what was really impactful for the scouts and for the seniors, too.”

Even though the project took place four years ago, Evan still feels its impact.

“When I look back on the photos of the project, I just have this humongous grin. I remember the seniors and their voices and their laughs. I loved seeing all these scouts (who) still continue to do origami even after the project,” he said.

Given the chance, he’d love to do more origami classes with seniors.

Fellow Blue Valley Northwest student Sai Narayan made a website about the problems he and others have experienced with racial microaggressions. He also got his friends together to do acts of community service throughout the community to encourage interaction between different groups.

“Our theme is if you ever have the chance to do something kind, do it. We specifically tried to do homeless shelter and food projects and do something kind for someone from a different background,” Sai said.

Metro area students Katie Dillon, Taylor Jett and Aidan Martel also received the scholarship for their efforts.

In the future, Andersen hopes to be able to raise enough money to award either more $1,000 scholarships or increase the amount of each scholarship.

For details of next year’s scholarship, keep an eye out for the application during the fall semester at sevendays.org/get-involved/for-students/kindness-action-competition.

This story was originally published April 19, 2022 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Ripple effect: Here’s how JoCo students showed kindness during SevenDays week."