Contact The Editor
Articles By This Author
Kristina Ulmer's younger sister, a waitress, worked the breakfast shift just hours before she died in a car accident in October 2014.
Ulmer and her parents were called to the accident scene in northeast Philadelphia, where Ulmer asked a police officer to climb into her sister's mangled car and retrieve her purse. It contained the tips that Katie Amodei, 29, had earned that morning - more than $100 worth.
"Katie was such a kind person, and I remember thinking, 'This money should go toward kindness,'" said Ulmer, 42. "I put the purse in a cabinet in my living room, and for a long time, I wondered what I could do with that money in Katie's memory."
In 2018, she settled on an idea.
Ulmer, an English teacher at Hatboro-Horsham High School in Horsham, Pennsylvania, had assigned her students to read "Fahrenheit 451," Ray Bradbury's 1953 novel about a future dystopian society.
"It's set in a time when everyone is glued to their screens and society lacks empathy," she said. "Sounds familiar, doesn't it? It popped into my head that I could have my students do acts of kindness with my sister's money."
"When we were growing up, Katie was always showing concern toward people she didn't even know. She was everyone's best friend," she added.
Ulmer told her students about her sister, then gave them each a crisp $20 bill. She'd exchanged her sister's tips at the bank and added several hundred dollars of her own money, so she had a total of $500.
The amount was enough for all 25 students in her English class. At the time, she was also the school's technology coach.
"I told them the way we prevent our world from becoming like the world in 'Fahrenheit 451' was through empathy and kindness," Ulmer said. "After I gave them the money, I told them I wanted them to perform an act of kindness with it, then record a little video about it."
Ulmer decided to call the project the $20 Kindness Challenge. Her students ran with it.
"One student went to a local diner, asked for a glass of water and left the waitress a $20 tip," she said. "Another girl knitted a bunch of little red caps for babies with heart problems, so they could be easily spotted in the NICU."
Some students made homemade treats for pets at a local animal shelter, while others used their $20 to buy toiletries and food for the homeless.
"One of my favorites was a student who bought $20 worth of doughnuts while visiting some of her family members in the Midwest," Ulmer said. "She stood on a corner with her uncle and randomly handed them out to people. It's something she continues to do now every year."
The following semester, Ulmer decided to continue the $20 Kindness Challenge with another class.
"More people started hearing about it, and pretty soon people were asking if they could donate to the cause," she said. "I'd come to school and find $20 in my mailbox."
Ulmer now hands out $20 bills twice a year and combines students' video clips into a montage for them to watch together. Since the project began, her students have spent more than $7,000 on acts of kindness, and the school now has a fund to accept donations, she said.
Ulmer now teaches ninth-graders and said she cries every year when she watches their videos.
"It's always bothered me when people stereotype teenagers and dismiss them like what they say doesn't matter," she said. "These kids have big hearts. They're incredibly thoughtful."
Sydney Cassel, 16, said she's participated in the $20 Kindness Challenge five times, even though she's no longer in Ulmer's class.
"The first time I did it, I went to the dollar store and bought holiday cards to give to people in a veterans' home," said Sydney, now a junior. "I loved knowing that what I wrote to each veteran would make them smile."
Since then, she and her friend Mackenzie Bombas, also 16, have made homemade treats twice a year and handed them out to teachers at school.
"The first time I participated in the challenge, I didn't think it would be possible to make a difference with $20, but I learned that's really not true," Sydney said. "You don't have to have millions - anyone can make a difference."
Sophomore Rachel Jasner said participating in two kindness projects was the highlight of her freshman year.
Last year, Rachel, 15, made homemade bookmarks and randomly put them in books at the local library with notes of encouragement. She also bought $20 worth of fleecy fabric and made blankets for dogs at a local animal shelter with two other students.
"Because of Mrs. Ulmer, I'm always looking for ways now to do little things to make people feel good," Rachel said. "It doesn't take that much time, and it's really rewarding and addicting to help."
Ulmer said she often imagines how her sister would have reacted to her students' acts of kindness.
"I believe she'd be ecstatic about how I used her tip money," she said. "I personally feel that this helps Katie live on. It's almost like she's here with me every semester when I do this."