Lower Schoolers Spread Kindness

SAS Teacher Volunteers in Ukraine

there? They're just so many unanswered questions.”

Countries all along the border of Ukraine, have a similar experience as Poland. Ultimately, they are giving up some of their country's future stability to aid in this crisis. Some people have opened up their homes to Ukrainians. “The level of sacrifice, in so many cases, is really humbling, because what we did doesn't even scratch the surface of what some people were doing in Poland every day,” said Mr. Ballard.

When asked what people in America, or Austin could do to help, Mr. Ballard said, “I will say that, for instance, with World Central Kitchen, they're an amazing organization people could donate directly to. There's a Ukrainian branch if you want to donate only to Ukraine, because [World Central Kitchen has locations] all over the world.” For anyone who wants to go to Ukraine, Mr. Ballard advises that they make sure they’re “connected to an actual organization, and have a job to do.” Right now, Mr. Ballard and his family are back in Austin, and have donated the $85,580 they raised to World Central Kitchen, which “will purchase more than 21,000 meals for the displaced.”

“It was a really powerful experience in so many ways,” Mr. Ballard says, “and I'm really glad we did it. Especially considering that we didn't really know what we were doing. We were just hoping that we could be of help. I think the biggest thing is just coming back and being able to talk about the experience a bit and hoping that people will continue to pay attention.”

About The Tartan Student Newspaper

Launched by Upper School Journalism Teacher Claire Canavan and her students, The Tartan is an exclusively student-written digital newspaper covering school and human interest stories about our St. Andrew’s community. Recent Tartan issues can be found at: https://sites. google.com/sasaustin.org/the-tartan/home

Kindness Abounds

This spring, if you received an unexpected gift of kindness, the Kindness Ninjas might have been the ones behind it. Each Thursday afternoon, a group of sixteen students in grades K-4 gathered in a top-secret location to plan random acts of kindness for the St. Andrew's community. They then embarked on super stealthy missions to spread joy and love to others. Some of their missions included leaving uplifting notes on teachers' windshields, baking cookies for members of the staff, leaving uplifting chalk art on sidewalks, making inspirational posters to hang in bathroom stalls, and hiding Easter eggs stuffed with jokes and encouraging words. fun was the anonymity of our little acts of kindness,” said 31st Street chaplain Ashley Brandon. “My hope is that the Kindness Ninjas will always remember how fun and gratifying it can be to bring joy to others, even in tiny ways."

Will T. '31 performs a random act of kindness via chalk message.