Jan. 31, 2025- How do you advance the effort of kindness when you already have a literal Kindness Club? Or a longstanding Key Club which is dedicated to leadership through serving others? This was the challenge facing High School North when the 2024-2025 district goals were announced and the Kindness Campaign initiated.

So, the school raised the kindness stakes.

"We have been using several new initiatives and tools that work toward making HSN an even more kind place," said Assistant Principal David Fazzini.

The most visible of these initiatives are the Mariner Medallions, a physical reward and incentive to exhibit positive behavior. Students earn the medallions by demonstrating one of the school's SAIL pillars: scholarship, attitude, integrity, and/or leadership.

"Our school's vision is that our students are models of these pillars throughout both our school and our community," said Fazzini. And if it's not a medallion, it's a sticker.

Medallions are worth even more than bragging rights; they can be cashed in for actual, tangible rewards. For details, check the menu (left). So having a medallion or rocking a sticker as evidence of kindness is fun and even lucrative, but they have to be truly earned ... and learned. That means lessons of kindness have to be taught, absorbed, and put into practice. It means that every club, committee, mantra, and initiative at North has to be pointed in the same direction ... apropos considering that whole mariner, compass, sailing thing.

"Our Behavior Committee has developed lessons through our Anchored in Success program focused on our SAIL pillars, along with other kindness characteristics, to help our students understand how to empathize and be kind to one another," said Fazzini. "These lessons have included students writing pledges of kindness, writing letters of gratitude to local veterans, creating snowflakes with messages of generosity, and learning about what it means to be a good citizen."

Behavior Committee, Anchored in Success, SAIL, Key Club ... and we haven't even touched on the aforementioned Kindness Club or, more accurately, The Acts of Kindness Society. TAKS, as it's known, is dedicated to spreading kindness not only in the school, but throughout the community, and meets monthly for activities and discussions "all in the name of making the world a better place."

What does that entail, exactly? Well, sometimes it means an act as simple as surprising someone on their birthday.

No wonder the demand for medallions and stickers is straining the supply.

And yet there's more work to be done.

"In the coming months, we'll be recognizing and celebrating all of our students' demonstrations of kindness through a paper chain, which will have links added as symbols of the acts of kindness that have been witnessed here at HSN," said Fazzini.

So yes, the kindness stakes at HSN have indeed been raised. And the world is a better place for it.