Somebody who Brittany-Lynn Shaw doesn’t know made her day on Feb. 14.
And the same could be said for her friend, Gabriella Abrams, and every other student at Langley Secondary, and all the teachers and counsellors, special ed assistants, secretaries and the principal and vice-principal.
In organized, random acts of kindness, everyone at the school was given a red paper heart with a message that imparted positive words.
It was just the right thing for a school that has been in the news for all the wrong reasons: two lockdowns in three months after reports that a student was in the school with a weapon.
Feb. 14 returned a positive tone to the school, offering an opportunity to celebrate Valentine’s Day “in a very caring and inclusive manner,” said principal Dawne Tomlinson.
“We called it Sweetheart Day.”
For two or more weeks, staff members wrote positive comments on the hearts, ensuring that every student received an authentic positive comment. Leadership students put together positive comments about each staff member and these were pinned on the wall of the staff room.
“Every every single student and staff member in the school had a beautiful red heart on the wall of the entry of the hallway with something positive about them on the reverse side of the heart,” Tomlinson said.
When they walked in the front door in the morning, students were greeted by walls of beautiful red hearts and decorations throughout the main entry way of the school. They were given sweetheart suckers and pencils with hearts on them to start their day.
“It was a fabulous way to start the day for everyone at LSS,” Tomlinson said.