NEW! Activities spread over two weeks April 13-24
When the world hands you lemons, it’s time to make lemonade.
Kansas City’s annual kindness experience — SevenDays Make a Ripple, Change the World — will take place over two weeks April 13-25, 2021 — with all activities and programs taking place virtually. Nothing can stop kindness, and SevenDays remains committed to spreading it at a time when the world needs it now more than ever.
SevenDays is part of The Faith Always Wins Foundation that was created following the murders of 14-year-old Reat Underwood, his grandfather Dr. William Corporon and Terri LaManno outside of Jewish facilities on April 13, 2014. Now in its seventh year, SevenDays is focused on providing opportunities that encourage all people to increase kindness through knowledge, mindset and behaviors. In a year that has been filled with hateful acts and violence, SevenDays provides an opportunity to bring the community together.
“While our families will always remember, we are also healing and moving onward with passion,” said Mindy Corporon, Reat’s mother and Dr. Corporon’s daughter as well as SevenDays co-founder. “Our passion is to help others through their own personal tragedy, to explore another faith and to find commonalities with their neighbor or co-worker through acts of kindness. We are all human,” Corporon said.
“The majority of us do not want violence, terrorism or even sarcastic remarks about our religion, so let’s continue the conversation. We want to enjoy the world in which we live and leave it in a better place. We can do this through understanding commonalities, and SevenDays provides the platform for this engagement.”
The lineup
SevenDays 2021 will offer programming with daily themes.
“We decided to spread our activities over a longer time period to provide the public with more opportunities to fit us into their busy lives,” Corporon said.
The SevenDays lineup of kindness includes (*all times are Central Standard Time):
- April 13 — LOVE DAY (6:30 p.m.): A celebration of the youth in Kansas City. SevenDays will also announce its Act of Kindness scholarship winners and recognize a Kansas Citian with its new Ripple of Kindness Award.
- April 15 — DISCOVER DAY (6:30 p.m.): Tour of a local Hindu temple, learn how to cook a favorite Indian dish and discover and compare a day in the life of an Indian and American teen.
- April 17 — YOU DAY (10:30 a.m.): Hands-on activities that focus on taking care of your mind, body and soul!
- April 19 — GO DAY (6:30 p.m.): Engage in this interfaith workshop with a panel representing four diverse faiths as well as a tour of a local Islamic center.
- April 20 — CONNECT DAY (10:30 a.m.): Make our world a better place by connecting through this women’s only networking event focused on kindness, interfaith understanding and healing. (*Please note: Space is limited for this event.)
- April 22 — OTHERS DAY (6:30 p.m.): Five-time Nobel Peace Prize nominee Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish will share his journey of peace and human dignity. Dr. Abuelaish will also participate in a caring conversation with Kansas City religious leaders the Rev. Adam Hamilton of Church of the Resurrection and Rabbi Arthur Nemitoff of The Temple, Congregation B’nai Jehudah.
- April 25 — ONWARD DAY: Join in our first virtual Kindness Walk as we commit to spreading ripples of kindness beyond SevenDays.
Each event of SevenDays will shine the spotlight on 14 local charities and how they spread kindness in our community; 14 charities are chosen because that was the age of Reat Underwood when he was murdered. SevenDays encourages the public to find a way to “make a ripple” and spotlights these 14 charities as possible organizations to help.
While most of SevenDays activities are free and open to all, registration is requested through the organization’s website, GiveSevenDays.org.
Buttons and stickers
A signature of SevenDays is its colorful, creative buttons with designs reflecting each day’s theme. This year’s buttons (and stickers) were designed by eight area high school students.* The stickers are available for free by ordering through the SevenDays website under the Shop tab.
Eleven area communities have signed on as SevenDays Supportive Cities: Independence, Kansas City, Missouri, Leawood, Lenexa, Merriam, Mission, Olathe, Overland Park, Parkville, Prairie Village and Shawnee. As a SevenDays Supportive City, each has committed to promoting kindness and encouraging its citizens to participate in virtual experiences.
Complete details and registration links will be provided on the SevenDays website, and through the Give SevenDays Facebook page, Instagram and Twitter.
SevenDays 2021 Button Design Winners:
- Love: Laylah Stevens, senior at Shawnee Mission Northwest
- Discover: Natalie Kelley, freshman at Shawnee Mission South
- Others: Emily Bougher, junior at Blue Valley Southwest
- Connect: Sarah Gordon, junior at Blue Valley
- You: Rebekah Hartwig, senior at Lee’s Summit West
- Go: William Mehnert, junior at Shawnee Mission Northwest
- Onward: Julia Todd, junior at Shawnee Mission Northwest
- SevenDays: Joy Yan, sophomore at Blue Valley North
About SevenDays:
SevenDays 2021 continues the healing journey following the murders that took the lives of Dr. William Corporon, his grandson Reat Underwood and Teresa LaManno outside of Jewish facilities in April 2014. The three lost their lives at the hands of a convicted Neo-Nazi shooter.
Faith Always Wins Foundation, a Kansas City-based nonprofit organization, is determined to make a difference through acts of kindness and interfaith dialogue. The organization’s three pillars are faith, kindness and healing and it is working to make a difference.
SevenDays is the organization’s annual series of experiences demonstrating how hatred, bigotry and ignorance can be overcome by kindness and understanding each other. Determined to turn tragedy into triumph, family members and friends joined together to create something positive to overcome this senseless hate crime.
SevenDays is under the leadership of Mindy Corporon and Director Jill Andersen, who has been involved since the beginning. The SevenDays Planning Committee consists of a diverse group of volunteers who work for months on the annual experience. They are joined by the Kindness Youth Leadership Team (KYLT), 32 area high school students representing a variety of faiths including Christian, Hindu, Catholic, Jewish and Muslim. The KYLT learns leadership skills and works to promote kindness in their own communities. Each member of this youth team is paired with an adult partner in a mentoring relationship. Together, these volunteers are planning and executing each aspect of SevenDays.
SevenDays encourages people to create their own kindness activities, take a photo and share them through SevenDays social media sites using #givesevendays, #betheripple and #spreadkindnessnotcorona. Information about the themes, activities and events will be continuously updated on the SevenDays website, www.GiveSevenDays.org as well as the Facebook page @GiveSevenDays.
