Ellie here, from the Bridger-Teton National Forest in Wyoming, USA. If you missed meeting me last month, I’m a contributing board member and HIP educator. Let’s go with announcements first:

HIP Happenings

• HIP hired a new social media manager this month that we’re excited to introduce you to in our next newsletter issue.

• HIP Strategic Planning continues across 6 time zones this month. If you are interested in serving on the HIP Board of Directors, please reach out with questions, why you are interested, and your CV to [email protected]

• We are excited to be formally evaluating our Level Two Hero Training program. One question we have is how we can help future participants develop a method of self-evaluation they can use to measure how the L2 course improved their performance in their chosen domain of change.

• Join us for discussions about heroism news, education, and research every third Wednesday of the month (or Thursday morning, for those in Oceania and East Asia) on the HIP World Chat. Email [email protected] to attend.

Parenting Heroes

The kids (including myself) are returning to school in the US. I live near a primary school and many parents use electric bikes to haul 2-3 kids to school at a time in large “buckets” on the back or front (something we Americans probably think we invented, despite the rickshaw having been perfected in Japan since the mid-1800s). This has made me think a little about my own future parenting style…whether I’ll bike my kids to school or make them walk while I drink my coffee in peace…..and what I can do as a future parent to help encourage heroic behavior in my kids.

HIP reinforces this at every opportunity: heroes are ordinary people who actively choose a path of extraordinary action to help others despite risk or sacrifice. This fact is underscored by this blog post discussing the origin of the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission. Over the years, hundreds of Carnegie Hero Fund Award Recipients have proven in interviews to be “actually very ordinary people”. But we do see some common denominators across all those Carnegie Heroes…

One of those commonalities is in the parenting these heroes received. This paper points to parent attitudes as significant precursors to heroic behavior: there is a correlation between the Carnegie Heroes parents expecting their kids to help others and the attitude that Carnegie Heroes later expressed in their need to save another’s life, despite the risk it posed to them in the moment.

So what can you do as a parent to encourage heroism? We know a few things from the research:

• Model the Way: Make sure your behaviors very clearly demonstrate to your child how to help, how to express compassion, and how to act kindly. Using the term “everyday hero” or “everyday heroism” to describe this category of behaviors and traits can be helpful.

• Create Helping Opportunities: Look for ways you can put your child in safe, age-appropriate scenarios where helping is warranted. Picking up trash on a walk, checking in on an elderly neighbor, and asking a kid who sits alone at lunch to be their “lunch buddy” are all low-hanging fruit. Take your kid to your own volunteer gigs (let’s hope my kids like splitting rocks on trail builds!) and introduce them to the volunteers in your circle.

• Connect to your Kids’ School: Ask your school leadership the school approaches topics like “character education”, “social emotional intelligence” and “anti-bullying”. If appropriate, you might decide to recommend the HIP Hero Club as a resource for teaching kids about prosocial behavior in grades 8-12.

Thoughts on Heroes Around the World:

• Slovakians are everyday heroes, responding to the Russia-Ukranian war at their doorsteps in the only way they know how: with compassion and a helping hand. This video by UNICEF profiles how a psychologist, a firefighter, a pediatrician, and a kindergarten teacher are each applying their individual skills in unique ways to support Ukrainian refugees of war. 

• Speaking of rickshaws and funky bikes, Mark Epeiyon, a taxi driver from Katilu in Turkana County, Kenya is using his dirtbike and sidecar as an off-hours ambulance for the local rural community. A community health volunteer with training in basic public health strategies, Mark helps advise patients at home and transports them to treatment centers for more advanced care when needed. Mark faces the physical risks of the rough, rural terrain as he bumps over desert and bush as well as the security risks posed by thugs who often rob vulnerable travelers. Volunteers like Mark are essential to enhance preventative care and access to care in rural areas of Kenya. 

• This week marks the 23rd anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks in New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington D.C. that killed nearly 3,000 American citizens. This story tells how a head of security in the South Tower, Rick Rescorla, saved an estimated 2,700 lives on 9/11 simply because he had insisted that the employees he worked to protect perform building escape drills. During the attacks, Rescorla refused to obey a command from officials to shelter in place and instead picked up a megaphone and insisted that all the employees follow the evacuation plan they had practiced. Rescorla’s actions underscore the idea of the “proactive hero”: his efforts to prepare in advance meant that dramatic and risk-laden acts of heroism were not necessary. The group “simply” walked down the stairwell. They were four city blocks away when the South Tower collapsed.

How has HIP or heroes impacted your life and made you who you are today? Send 400 words or less to [email protected] and we might include your story in our next newsletter.

See you next month!