
Strength of the Week – Kindness
As a Catholic school in the Lasallian tradition, we often reflect on the teachings of St John Baptist de La Salle, who is also the patron saint of teachers. He is credited with establishing a philosophy and practice of teaching which encompasses the whole student, and which teaches the value of love and kindness.
In truth, I believe that we are all inherently kind. Sometimes our intentions may get a bit confused, or we may not be at our best, and sometimes it’s also true that we can focus more on what’s wrong, rather than what’s right, so that the Kindness in front of us is not the first thing we see.
This week at St Michael’s College, as elsewhere in our world, we embrace NAIDOC week and we actively work to work towards better outcomes for all members of our community, under the caring and expansive guidance of Mr Spencer. In Years 7-9, we also recently viewed a performance called Wired, by Brainstorm Productions. Kindness features strongly in both of these areas. For one thing, it can help us to manage our social media contributions so that they do not hurt or offend. When we are reminded to post in kindness and with prudence, we know that this does help to avoid exclusion, offence or hurt, and helps us to work towards being the community where each person is known, valued and cared for. This is true both across the digital space and in person too!
We can look to the future in the hope of being forces of positive change. Earlier this year our kindness week focused on stronger awareness and promotion of this strength as Year 7s took a pledge to counter bullying behaviours with kindness, led by their newly appointed class leaders, Across the Campus, posters and visual reminders focused on the power of kindness and its contribution as an agent of change in our community and the world. The posters remain in place as a reminder of the value we place on this strength. This week our first Wild Wednesday lunch, which involved students in Year 7 and 8 coming together based on common interest areas, also led the way to a team-based experience laden with Kindness- and a pizza lunch to top it off! Please see the separate article this week!
In an article in The Advertiser, last year, it was affirmed that science proves that kindness benefits everyone. It spoke about kindness being the new ‘cool’ and went on to highlight a study which involved over 60,000 people from more than 144 countries, one of which was Australia. The results indicated that those who give, receive or even notice acts of kindness have higher wellbeing and life satisfaction. One of the fundamental teachings that we know of Jesus is to ‘love one another’. The wisdom of this advice prefaced the science of today by just a few years!
Have a wonderful holiday ahead- may we see and experience many acts of kindness!
Tonia Carfora, Year 7-9 Wellbeing Initiatives Leader