This year the Black Out Bullying campaign at Anderson Elementary School encouraged student activities to promote kindness and friendship at home, in school and throughout the community.
BY MICHEL DeJULIAN
Anderson Elementary School has been continuing to work hard to stop bullying behavior in its tracks. Beginning in October with Speaker Brian Williams, the students have been working on increasing their kindness by performing Random Acts of Kindness (RAKs) at school, at home and in the community.
This year the movement went global as the kids kicked off the year collecting more than 1,000 pairs of shoes for children in Ghana. Children in Ghana cannot attend school unless they have shoes and our students heard the message loud and clear. They did an awesome job bringing in donations and beginning their kindness journey here at Anderson for the year.
In January, Brian Williams returned to show the students the effect their kindness had on the children in Ghana. With video clips and pictures the children were amazed at what they were able to accomplish. Additionally, they held another donation drive, this time for the Grosse Ile Animal Shelter. The students collected over 500 items to donate.
During the month, the students also worked on doing as many RAKs as possible and were able to document over 2,500 acts. Efforts to create and run the programs were done by the fifth grade Leader In Me students. These students are selected for their exemplary behavior in the areas of respect, responsibility and safety in our school community.
A big thank you to the fifth grade teachers, Mrs. Teska, Mrs. Thomas and Mr. Plough, for not only allowing the students time to work together cooperatively in order to pull off these fantastic and very important events, but encouraging them to do their best for the students and staff.