The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
Kindness delivered during annual event
More than 40 educators from Riverside School District helped brighten up an otherwise mostly cloudy day on Aug. 7 by performing random acts of kindness throughout the community.
Those good deeds took place during Riverside Schools’ fifth annual Community Kindness Day.
“This is a day to show our thanks and appreciation to all the residents in the Riverside community who have been so supportive of the district,” said Nick Carrabine, Riverside Schools marketing and communications director.
During the event, Riverside teachers, education specialists and educators split into 11 teams of three to five members each, and headed out to random places to carry out random acts of kindness. The event began at 9 a.m., and in previous years, most teams have spent at least three or four hours in pursuit of giving back to the community, Carrabine noted.
“They may visit parks, local businesses, construction sites, parking lots and hand individuals bags of candy, school supplies or gift certificates,” he said. “In the past, we’ve had teams purchase pizzas and deliver to a fire department, or teams go to a local fast food restaurant and buy a customer their lunch, or teams drop off books to day cares.”
One of the teams participating in the Aug. 7 event consisted of four school teachers: Heather Hopkins and Stacy Inbody of Leroy Elementary; Lucia Knowles and Tana Ford of Buckeye Elementary; and Abby Hartmann, district literacy coordinator.
The quintet launched their outreach efforts by heading to Giant Eagle in Painesville Township to purchase bakery items to distribute at upcoming stops. While two team members went inside to shop, the other three associates stayed outside near store entrances to help shoppers load groceries into their cars and
“This is a day to show our thanks and appreciation to all the residents in the Riverside community who have been so supportive of the district.” — Nick Carrabine, Riverside Schools marketing and communications director
return carts.
Ford assisted Jeanne Runyon of Concord Township with her cart of groceries.
“This is so nice,” Runyon said. “It needs to be done more often, by everybody.”
Ford, who has participated in all five of Riverside’s Community Kindness Days, said the event is a rewarding experience.
“I think I really enjoy just getting out into the community and thanking everyone,” she said. “(The Riverside School District) is a large community. When you work at one school, you don’t always get to go to the other areas.”
While grocery-loading assistance required waiting for and choosing shoppers with full carts, the team also performed some good deeds of the drive-by variety. In Concord Township, the team’s vehicle got stopped at two construction zones, and they simply handed bottles of water out the window to traffic directors. Later, driving through a Concord subdivision, the team also distributed bottled water to contractors working outside of several homes.
One place where the group went inside a building to express kindness was at the Lake County Educational Service Center in Concord Township. The team left some baked goods for the staff at Lake County ESC, which provides Riverside Schools with substitute teachers and professional development programs.
In addition, Riverside elementary school secretaries had gathered as a group to work in a computer lab at Lake County ESC on Aug. 7. The secretaries were busy completing work needed for Riverside to start the new school year, when the Community Kindness team entered the room to deliver cakes, cookies and bottles of juice.
“Our secretaries do so much for us and are some of the kindest people we work with,” Hartmann said. “We just wanted to return the favor a little bit.”
Diana Pritt, secretary at Leroy Elementary School, said the team’s kind gesture meant a lot.
“It’s wonderful,” she said. “We appreciate this.”