November 9, 2022
ROCKY RIVER, Ohio - Students at Kensington Intermediate School (KIS) are working to spread kindness throughout the Rocky River community during the holiday season by teaming up with the local Starbucks. Led by the K-Kids Club and advisor and 5th grade teacher Karlee McLaughlin, every student at KIS had the opportunity to decorate and write a message on a Starbucks coffee sleeve.
The sleeves were used on beverages that were purchased and every sleeve featured an original design as students used markers to give them a splash of color with hand-written messages to spread kindness.
“This was one of my favorite things to do during my time at Kensington,” McLaughlin said. I gave the students some examples of messages and they used those examples to come up with their own personal messages.
There were about 1,300 total sleeves with messages on them that were given to the local Starbucks and the sleeves were gone in four days. McLaughlin noted that she did not expect the reaction that was received to the project, including emails and social media posts from people around the community who received coffee sleeves.
“Some of the notes said they received the message at a time when they needed it most,” McLaughlin said. “Kensington and K-Kids wanted to make an effort to impact the community and I think we were able to accomplish that.”
The K-Kids club at KIS is a great organization that does community service projects. They are currently working on a toiletry drive and will work with the Goldwood PTA for a Toy Drive next month. The group usually has about 25-30 members, but has grown to roughly 60 members this year.