Students at Bloomington Junior High School will leave positive messages behind as they leave school for the summer.
BJHS hosts a leadership club, partnering with Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc. The club covers topics like collaboration, service learning, career pathways, cultural awareness and STEM exploration. Students were tasked with coming up with a service project to promote kindness and discourage bullying.
Students wrote more than 700 positive and encouraging messages for their peers during lunch periods. Seven messages were selected for students to paint onto stepping stones, which will be placed just outside the entrance to the school.
“It will remind them to always be positive, like always look for the positive, even when there's a lot of negatives.” said Joel Leathers, a sixth grader who was credited with coming up with the idea for the service project. He wanted to promote kindness in response to some bullying issues that had occurred during the school year.
“It's going to make me feel good that others are feeling good too,” said Leathers.
Eighth grader Ansahna Tchapda thought it was a great opportunity to write a message on one of the stepping stones, even if she won’t be at BJHS next year.
“It's leaving my mark on the school, and it's kind to make people remember that they're awesome,” said Tchapda.
Eighth grader Desiryauanna Ruffins wrote her own message: "If other people lift you up, you should lift others up, too."
“Because some people feel very down and think that they should just lift others up and not put themselves first,” said Ruffins. “So it should be better for you to lift yourself up first, and try to lift others up as you go.”
“It was just really fun to do it,” said Carmen Patterson-Bolden, also an eighth grader who wrote a message. “It was a small group of us, but we didn't realize how many people it would affect. Like, this could affect generations of people. It could stay there for years.”
Students and their families were invited to a ceremony and after-school pizza party to further commemorate the project.
Alpha Kappa Alpha local chapter
The Bloomington-Normal graduate chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority sponsored the leadership club that was held at BJHS. The national organization gives chapters a way to work in local schools to teach leadership skills through its Youth Leadership Institute.
“It culminated in the minds of the students, and it was executed by the students,” said Natalie Brunson-Wheeler, president of the Omicron Delta Omega chapter of AKA, which is a Bloomington-Normal chapter. “And that's what leadership is about.”
“All of the students had roles, and we would have committee meetings within our sessions, and we met once a month for two hours, and we always talked through those sessions,” said Pauline Williams, co-chair of the Empower our Families Committee.
