Students at West Hall Middle School were welcomed to the school Friday by a team of their classmates offering free hugs.
"We're going to be in five stations throughout the school... greeting kids as they come in and just extending our arms for a free hug. Then we're going to take some data and see who takes our free hug," said Jana Brown, whose third period 8th grade advanced language arts planned the event.
Armed with posters and shirts, both of which read "Free Hugs" in bold letters, students stood in the cafeteria, gym, at the front of the school and at the bus and car drop off areas.
The kids initially watched a video as part of a journaling exercise in their class that showed people giving free hugs, getting both accepted and rejected.
"I had to get my hands on that. I had to be nice like that. That I could do that at my school," Quintavious Reed said, reacting to the video he saw in late August. Reed is a student in Brown's class. "You never know what somebody's going through in their day. They may need a hug."
"We were really moved by that. So we said, 'ok, so, we'll do this and maybe we can move on to bigger things,'" said Rosalia Milano.
"We thought we'd get started at the school and maybe do it somewhere else, like at the mall or at the high school," said Brianna Joseph.
It's not just fun and games. Brown had the students collect data on who accepted their hugs, and they planned to do the event again to learn more.
Brown said 26 students participated in the free hugs event.
"I think this tells kids that in the world of bad news, there's more good news than bad. Bad news just gets most of the attention. And this gives evidence that our kids are trying to show Hall County is the most caring place on Earth."
http://accesswdun.com/article/2018/10/720738/photos-west-hall-middle-students-give-out-free-hugs-to-fellow-spartans