Over 7,000 elementary school students will be encouraged to be kind to themselves and to be kind to one another through a weeklong effort at participating schools in Costa Mesa.
Orange County, CA -- Inspired by their unique lived experiences and shared passion to teach kids the importance of kindness to strengthen their social and emotional wellbeing, Rebekah Robeck, founder of Let’s Be Kind and Jeanette Knutti, founder of Moxie Marketing Agency are collaborating to share their messages of kindness with elementary school students in the Newport-Mesa Unified School District from November 14th to November 18th.
‘Kindness Week’ is part of a bigger movement to create a culture of kindness across school campuses across Orange County that is led by Let’s Be Kind, a local nonprofit. During ‘Kindness Week’, the nonprofit will distribute t-shirts to the students, teachers and school staff and coordinate activities to help bring social emotional interaction on school campuses.
This year Moxie Marketing Agency will participate by gifting over 350 teachers, librarians and staff a copy of its social emotional learning book titled Be Kind to Yourself, which was authored by its founder Jeanette Knutti.
Together the Orange County-based nonprofit and Orange County-based small business will share messages of being kind to yourself and being kind to others through this fun-filled week that is fueled by the passion of the founders and donations from the community.
What: World Kindness Day is Sunday November 13th. Let’s Be Kind is using this day to kick off ‘Kindness Week’ with Newport-Mesa Unified School District to help create a culture of unity through kindness in participating schools.
Why: Rebekah Robeck, who is now a freshman at Vanguard University, started the Let’s Be Kind movement in 2018 when she was only 13-years old as a solution to her own experience of kids not being kind to her at school. She brought pizza and taped ‘Let’s Be Kind to Each Other’ signs on the boxes to encourage kindness. She later came up with the t-shirt idea, and she raised over $3,000 in 24 hours that year to purchase 700 t-shirts for every student, faculty and staff member on her campus. What inspired Rebekah was seeing every student for one day unified for one purpose: kindness. Kindness began to break down walls that day on her campus.
Jeanette Knutti wrote Be Kind to Yourself in loving memory of her late husband Josh who was passionate about helping others overcome their struggles with mental health through his podcast Overcoming You. She wrote the story based upon the real life events of Josh discovering that many struggles with mental health begin in childhood and thus working to plant the seed of self-love in kids by asking them what they liked about themselves. Jeanette realized that Josh‛s legacy didn‛t have to end, and so she used her own storytelling and creative abilities to bring his interactions with real children to life in the enchanted world of the book. She hopes that through Be Kind to Yourself, Josh‛s important lesson will extend into every early grade classroom to teach children the truly magical skill of loving themselves.
How: The kindness movement started by Let’s Be Kind has been officially sanctioned by the Newport-Mesa Unified School Board. Let’s Be Kind coordinates activities with participating schools and obtains donations from the local community to provide these special days and weeks on campuses. Let’s Be Kind will reach over 10,000 elementary, middle and high school students and the Be Kind to Yourself book will be read to over 7,000 elementary school students.
Those interested in supporting ‘Kindness Week’ can make a donation at LetBeKind.org/Donate and those interested in donating a ‘Be Kind to Yourself’ book can do so at BeKindtoYourselfBook.com/Donate. Additionally, community members can purchase ‘Let’s Be Kind’ merchandise to spread the kindness message while supporting the nonprofit from their online store.