Let’s make kindness contagious!
Written by Sammie Vance
Hi I’m Sammie Vance. I’m eleven years old and I live in Fort Wayne, Indiana. I love to spread kindness and encourage others that they can too! In 2017, when I was 8 years old, I heard about buddy benches at a church camp. A buddy bench is a place for when someone is lonely, shy or bullied, where they can sit on it and others will know to ask them to play. I had been lonely and knew other kids were too, so I knew my school needed them. I drew a comic explaining how a buddy bench worked and spoke to my principal. He said we would try and get one in a year since collecting 400 pounds of caps needed for one 6 foot bench may take awhile.
Being the go getter that I am, I did this project differently because I collected lots of plastic caps and lids myself to make the buddy benches! I spread the word by asking lots of friends, classmates, pharmacies, coffee shops and other businesses to help me collect caps. With the communities help, we collected 1,600 pounds of caps in only 2 months! This was enough for 3 buddy benches for my school with plenty of leftover caps to help other schools get started.