Fifteen years ago, the global Pink Shirt Day movement started as a way to promote kindness and take a stand against bullying. It's celebrated annually on the last Wednesday of February and typically sees local schools, businesses and members of the community sporting their pink tees in solidarity.

Today, the Boys and Girls Club (BGC) of Cochrane and Area are among the many local organizations taking part in Pink Shirt Day initiatives. Site Supervisor for BGC Cochrane, Samantha Owad says that kindness and inclusion are the messages they are spreading today, and it all starts with a dialogue.

"Some of the stories can be quite emotional," explains Owad. "It's just listening to their stories and letting them talk about it because a lot of children find it difficult to speak out. So, today is a really good way that we can show them that it is okay to speak out and just be themselves."

Owad says that they want to create a safe space for the kids to have conversations about their feelings, how to handle them and how to be good friends.

"We are just trying to empower the children and give them ways of dealing with certain situations, how we can uplift people and spread kindness," explains Owad. "At the end of the day, we don't want anyone to feel like they're alone. We just want to make sure everyone is safe and happy in the skin they're in."

She says leading up to today, the kids took part in a week-long wave of kindness, and now the aim is to keep it rolling. 

"We are following on from activities that we started for Kindness week; which was last week," explains Owad. "So we call it 'filling their buckets' --writing down different, kind things to their friends to hopefully make their day."

The kids at BGC Cochrane have taken a kindness pledge: "to be kind in every way, to every person big or small, and help them if they fall."

Pink Shirt Day started in Nova Scotia back in 2007 and it is now recognized right across the globe.