Are You Willing To Pay It Forward?

This Thursday we hope and expect that Everton Park residents will be caught up in ANZAC Day celebrations and services; however, we’d also like to let you know about another event being celebrated internationally on the same day, ‘Pay It Forward Day’.

You may have seen the movie starring Kevin Spacey, Helen Hunt and Haley Joel Osment, which first brought the concept to many of us… do a random good deed and ask the recipient to pay it forward.  It seems like such a lovely, simple idea – and it is.

There are loads of ideas on the http://payitforwardday.com website to provide inspiration for individuals, teachers and businesses to get involved.  Some of our favourites are:

For Everton Park residents:

• Buy a stranger a cup of coffee and give them a pay it forward card.
• Buy a train/bus ticket for the person behind you and pass it to them with a pay it forward card.
• If it’s raining, buy a few cheap umbrellas and hand them out to anyone getting wet (attach your pay it forward card to the umbrella).
• Donate your professional services – Offer a free consultation to someone in need on the day, and ask them to pay a good deed forward.

For Everton Park Schools:

• Allocate a day or week to celebrate ‘paying t forward’.  Brainstorm ideas with children for how they can help Pay It Forward.  Ideas might include asking somebody to play who may be alone in the playground, asking older students to come and provide peer tutoring to a younger class, allocating buddies for the playground, so everyone has somebody else looking out for them in the school yard.

For Everton Park businesses:

• Sponsor a team who make a difference in the community.
• Donate funds to a favourite charity.
• Have a departmental challenge whereby each department competes with each other to make a big positive contribution to the community.

Basically what this list tells us is, the sky’s the limit!  When there are so many terrible and terrifying events occurring around the world seemingly daily, why not use this ANZAC Day as an opportunity to restore the trust and good faith – if at least in our own Everton Park community – and do a good deed for a stranger.  If every Everton Park person does one good deed, and each of those good deeds are then paid forward, just imagine the difference we could make.