On Thursday, October 27th Born This Way Foundation and Monster High hosted our very first Kind Monsters EDU event. Along with 150 middle school students from the LA area, we spent the day embarking on some creative problem solving to improve their schools.

The morning began with the students getting to hear first hand from a designer from Monster High exactly how the brand was created. Each Monster High Doll is different and unique however, they are all accepted for who they are.

(Here at Born This Way Foundation, we’re so proud to have our very own Monster High Doll, Zomby Gaga, modeled after our co-founder Lady Gaga!)

This got the brain juices flowing as the students were then able to create their own perfect “Monster Student”. Using everything from pipe cleaners to Play Doh, our teams were able to stand by and watch the creativity spark.

The students worked together with peers from different schools to come up with stories and backgrounds for their own “little monsters”.

My favorite part of the morning was getting to hear all of the stories and traits that the young people created for their monsters. Hearing descriptions using words like “kind, brave, different, happy, loyal and trustworthy” was so encouraging.

The afternoon absolutely blew me away.

I spent the week leading up to Kind Monsters being so afraid to facilitate my first event. I was so nervous about getting up in front of people and speaking and I was terrified of embarrassing myself. However, when I got to hear dozens of students from the participating schools stand up on stage and tell a room full of their peers, teachers and principals exactly what they want to change in their school and how they plan on changing it; I was inspired by each and every one of them.

Representatives from each school spoke about about problems like bullying, violence, cliques and a lack of inclusivity in their schools and then told us all how they plan on fixing these problems.

Each student who spoke was poised, prepared and passionate about making a change.

I am so thankful I was given the opportunity to help plan and facilitate this event. And I left excited to continue working with these students and help them change the cultures and climates in their schools.

If you want to be a part of the Kind Monsters movement, you can take the #KindMonsters pledge!

I hope you’ll be a part of our mission to make every school kinder, braver and more inclusive.