Wishing you a peaceful, healthy, and joyful holiday season and New Year!
For the 80th thru 82th consecutive weeks, the Center for Peace & Conflict Studies has compiled a list of acts of kindness and peace. The initiative began as a response to COVID-19 and the racism pandemic but has broadened to include any act of compassion or service to others. Please share these stories. If you have stories of positive acts people/organizations are taking and you would like to share them, please email them to Brandon Miller at peacecenter@bsu.edu. All the stories starting from week 1 are available online. Additionally, you can follow the Peace Center on social media (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter) at bsu4peace.
Week 80
High School Construction Class Builds Shelter for 5-Year-Old Wheelchair User
Ryder Willam, 5, was born with spina bifida myelomeningocele and has used a wheelchair since he was two. That mobility limitation means that Ryder cannot rush and must plan ahead. For example, Ryder is pushed down to the end of his driveway by his parents a few minutes early so that he will not miss the bus. However, this means that Ryder has to wait there even on days when the bus runs late. When the weather is poor, Ryder ends up stuck in the rain, wind, and or snow with nothing but a patio umbrella to shield him. In the search for a bus hut to serve as shelter, Tim, Ryder’s father, ended up reaching out to the local high school. The construction technology teacher, Dan McKena, decided to make a class project out of building a hut from scratch. Three of his students spent weeks designing and building the shelter for Ryder. They finished and delivered it in November. The final product was an 8x5 foot hut capable of fitting Ryder and a caretaker. Both Ryder and his dad loved it. “Ryder’s first reaction was “Holy Cow!”, he loved it and wants to hang out it in all the time,” Tim said. On school mornings, Ryder can be found in the hut dry and warm waiting for the bus. At other times, according to his dad, Ryder also uses it as a play fort.
Source: https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/teens-build-bus-stop-shelter-for-5-year-old-wheelchair-user/
Man Packs up His Grill and Delivers Freshly Cooked Food to Tornado Victims
The US Midwest and South were recently hit with a rash of tornadoes that left many dead and destroyed thousands of buildings. Jim Finch of Kentucky figured that people would be needing food, as many were without electricity and fresh food was in short supply. “I know they don’t have no electricity, so that means they don’t have no electric, no restaurants, no running water, so I just figured I’d do what I can do,” Finch said. “Show up with some food and some water.” And that’s exactly what he did. By packing his truck with food, water, and a grill, Finch demonstrated that, with a bit of inspiration, making a positive impact in the world can be as simple as firing up the BBQ.
Source: https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/man-loads-his-truck-with-grill-and-food-to-help-tornado-victims-in-kentucky/
Week 81
Coder and Entrepreneur from Zimbabwe Launches Program to Teach Coding to Children Throughout Africa
After graduating high school, Eric Khumalo was accepted into UC Berkeley on a scholarship from the Mastercard Foundation. At Berkeley, he became inspired by the stories of a professor who had learned to code as a kid and then used those skills to make games. “…for me I just admired the wonderful things he could accomplish with just code,” Khumalo said. “I found it interesting – this power to create, and this power to solve problems…” After taking a semester off and teaching a coding class in Zimbabwe, Khumalo established a goal of sharing that power with others. He then designed a course to teach the foundations of computer science and coding at the American embassy in Zimbabwe. As the popularity of that course grew, so did Khumalo’s ambition until he created Emzini WeCode – an online program that has taught more than 1000 students to date.
Source: https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/eric-khumalo-offers-free-coding-classes-in-his-home-of-zimbabwe-called-emzini-wecode/
93-Year-Old Donates Private Island in Quebec to Nature Conservancy of Canada
After immigrating to Canada from Swedent several decades ago, Thor Wikström fell in love with a small, 7-acre island that he could see from his new home in the town of Laval. Eventually, Wikström persuaded the owner of that island to sell and, for years afterward, forged family memories on the island – resisting advances from real estate professionals interested in developing the island into residential or commercial property. Now, Wikström has decided to protect his slice of paradise in perpetuity by donating the island to Nature Conservancy of Canada. According to a statement by the conservancy: “The [family] has taken great care of [the island], and with this very meaningful act we are protecting the natural diversity of this unique habitat for the benefit of the animal and plan species that live there, but also for future generations.”
Source: https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/thor-vikstrom-donates-his-beautiful-private-island-of-ile-ronde-to-conservation/
Nonprofit Protects At-Risk Tenants in Lebanon from Illegal Eviction
Rent hikes, real estate speculation, and illegal eviction disproportionately impact low-income tenants, and all of these issues are at play in Lebanon due to a lack of adequate housing policy and enforcement. Various crises over the past several years have exacerbated the existing issues. Housing Monitor, a tenant support organization, is fighting those injustices via a hotline, legal representation, and community organizing. Its work has earned the nonprofit an award from the United Nations housing agency – the World Habitat Award. David Ireland, head of World Habitat, says “Housing Monitor sines a light on the injustices and empowers people to be able to report violations – eviction, abandoned properties, properties built without permissions – and it holds government companies and property owners to account.” Its legal representatives build cases for tenants based on international protocols for tenants’ rights. Housing Monitor has prevented the evictions of more than 90 households. Hundreds of other tenants have been able to negotiate greater housing security with the organization’s help.
Source: https://www.goodgoodgood.co/articles/lebanon-housing-rights
Week 82
A Women’s Collective in El Salvador are Fighting to Protect Vulnerable Residents and the Environment from a Massive Urban Development Project
A major real estate development project in El Salvador, known as Ciudad Valle El Angel project, threatens to clear nearly 1000 acres of forest and divert 4.5 million gallons of water from the Chacalapa River watershed. A group of women are standing up to that project to prevent its massive impact on the environment. The region north of the country’s capital, San Salvador, relies heavily on subsistence farming; over 60,000 people would have their way of life radically altered should the project be completed. The Kawoq Women’s Collective is an eco-feminist organization that is protesting the project. Its coordinator, Sara Garcia, says “Nothing about the project benefits the poorer classes. They’re building this for the upper classes, for the people who can pay.” The collective has partnered with other organizations to initiate letter-writing campaigns, sit-ins, and protests. So far the efforts have yielded some changes to the plan, including moving wells further away from vulnerable residents who would have been harmed by their presence. Although the collective is still fighting to stop construction, the lawsuit it and its partners have raised have managed to delay the project.
Source: https://www.goodgoodgood.co/articles/women-ciudad-valle-el-angel-el-salvador
Tree Planting Initiative in Chicago is Combatting Climate Change and Environmental Racism
In November, Chicago passed a $188 million climate package. Part of the package involves planting 75,000 new trees, many of which will be planted in communities populated by people of color. These communities have been disproportionately deprived of green spaces and parks and, as a result, suffer from worse air quality. Increased tree cover will cool down areas that have become heat islands and improve air quality, which will reduce residents’ risk of health problems associated with air pollution.
Source: https://www.goodgoodgood.co/articles/chicago-tree-planting
Craft Brewery Installs Carbon Capture Technology to Make Climate Friendly Beer
Beer and CO2 tend to go hand in hand. The yeast used in the fermentation process breaks down sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide. Much of that CO2 gets released into the atmosphere. But thanks to advances in carbon capture technology – and the efforts of some beer-drinking climate enthusiasts – it is now possible to capture the CO2 released during the fermentation of beer and use it to carbonate and pa
ckage the final product. The system, developed by Earthly Labs in Austin, Texas, has allowed Alan Binton, owner of Grey Sail Brewing in Rhode Island, to capture approximately 2000 pounds of CO2 monthly; as the brewery’s production accelerates in warmer months, that amount will increase. He installed the carbon capture technology during COVID and is one of about three dozen craft breweries who use Earthly Labs’s system. The chief executive of Earthly Labs, Amy George, says “Annually, each of these brewers can capture the equivalent of the absorption work of 1500 trees if they use the technology every week.”
Source: https://www.goodgoodgood.co/articles/good-news-brewery-carbon-capture-beer