Aug. 25, 2021 - After a stressful year of coping with the pandemic and online instruction, Herff Elementary School students and staff will focus on kindness as they begin the 2021 school year. 

Herff Elementary, which is within San Antonio ISD, is one of 82 schools nationwide awarded funding by the Choose Kindness Foundation, a philanthropic organization founded earlier this year. This new year-long initiative will seek to engage students in a consistent effort to implement kindness-related activities and behaviors—be friendly, show appreciation, offer help and reach out to those in need—across a variety of school and community settings. 

According to Foundation officials, the $5,000 award honors the commitment to kindness Herff Elementary already has made over the years. The grant was awarded based on the school’s demonstration of a systematic, evidence-based approach to developing pro-social behaviors for at least three years. Together Herff Elementary School and the Foundation will begin an active partnership to teach and celebrate kindness with the intention of creating a welcoming, inclusive and caring school environment. 

According to the Foundation, these behaviors have been shown to promote strong interpersonal relationships and offer participating schools a relatively simple way to create a culture of caring, particularly during this difficult time of increasing mental health challenges. The Foundation notes that students across the nation lost more than just academic learning last year. For many, school closure meant the loss of their social world, and the Foundation saw that their mental health suffered. 

The work of the Choose Kindness Foundation is informed by decades of research into the benefits of kindness and effective strategies to develop it. According to the Foundation, practicing kind behaviors over the K-12 years can have a profound positive impact on the well-being and happiness of students through creating more caring relationships at home, with friends, and throughout the community. 

Foundation funding will serve over 47,000 students across the country during the 2021-22 school year. Through grant funding, online resources and trainings, the Foundation works with recipient schools to engage all students in a consistent effort to learn and practice kind behaviors that are shown to increase academic, social, emotional and behavioral competence.