CELEBRATE OUR UNSUNG HEROES
Join us in recognizing and celebrating the military and veteran children in your communities!
APRIL IS MONTH OF THE MILITARY CHILD
Kids Rank supports military children all year round but April is a time for everyone to join us in recognizing these Unsung Heroes! After a long and challenging year, we are excited to have found some ways to keep our community connected while staying safe. Unless otherwise specified, these activities are open to civilian and military families!
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April 1: Foundations Session with Sesame
April 8: Foundations Session with USO Illinois
April 10: Amazing Family Adventure with USO Illinois
April 10-17: 2nd Annual Virtual 5K
April 15: Foundations Session with Military Child Panel
April 15: Purple Up Day!
All Month: Kids Rank Collaborative Art Project
All Month: Kids Rank Welcome & Farewell Kits
Scroll down to find more information on these events and how you can support Kids Rank during the month of April!
All Foundations sessions are open to the public
Foundations Conversations are held on Zoom and streamed live on Facebook at 12:00-1:00 CST. To stay current on the most recent session register through the link below.
Visit our Foundations page to check out past session recordings.
April 1st
To kick off Month of the Military Child, Kids Rank is excited to have a conversation with our special guests from Sesame Workshop. We will talk about why Sesame Street for Military Families: a free, bilingual (English and Spanish) website where families can find information and multimedia resources on the topics of military deployments, multiple deployments, homecomings, injuries, grief, and self-expression is needed and was created.
April 8th
Collaboration between organizations can be a magical experience! For the last 3 years, Kids Rank and USO Illinois have partnered to celebrate Month of the Military Child with an interactive family event. This partnership has shown how good collaboration does nothing but benefit those that we serve. Join us as we chat with USO Illinois about how to be great community collaborators, how they have done a rock star job at pivoting during the pandemic and our upcoming joint family event in April.
April 15th
Kids Rank is all about the military child, so of course during Month of the Military Child we wanted to talk to them directly! During this special Foundations Conversation we are honored to have a panel of military children from the Vietnam era to current day who will share their unique experiences over time. Our moderator, Erica Bauer with the Chicago Bulls Organization and a military child herself, will guide the conversation addressing the similarities and differences of growing up in a military family now and in the past.
GET MOVING FOR MILITARY KIDS!
(open to all military and civilian families)
Join us in celebrating military and veteran children in your community with our virtual 5K! This family friendly event will take place April 10th-17th. We want families to get out and moving- form a team and move a 5K however you’d like- walk, run, bike, skate- whatever works for you!
All registered runners will be mailed race day gear, including a tee shirt, bib, and medal.
Register by March 20 to guarantee your gear by race day!
PARTNER AND FAMILY EVENTS
Click on the pictures for more information!
COLLABORATIVE ART PROJECT
MOVE A MILE!
HOW WOULD YOU LIKE TO GIVE BACK?
Give Your Time
We are looking for motivated people to create a positive experience in the lives of our military kids. There are a few opportunities in different capacities within Kids Rank that we wanted to share with you.
But first, WE WANT TO LEARN MORE ABOUT YOU! Please take a few minutes to fill out the survey below. This will help us figure out what make you smile and will align with our CONNECT, LEAD, SERVE mission!
Some of the volunteering roles require some training with greater time commitments and others allow for shorter drop-in options to fit into a variety of schedules. The important thing to remember is that every volunteer helps create an impact with our Kids Rank Members!
Give To Our Welcome and Farewell Kits
Military children will often move outside the normal school year calendar.To help these children feel valued and recognized, we are collecting items to be given out when a family moves to or from the community
These Welcome and Farewell Kits will be shared with schools and partners to make sure that military children entering and leaving our communities feel a sense of belonging.
To support this effort, you can purchase items from our Amazon wish list. This list contains small items that will be sent to our office and put into the kits.!