Each spring, Seattle's Catharine Blaine Elementary School holds a school dance to raise money for next year's fifth grade field trip.
It sounds totally harmless, except for one big oversight: The dance is for fathers and daughters only.
That leaves a lot of people out of the fun, and out of the fundraiser, like the many children raised by single mothers.
Sometimes when we have the best of intentions we lose sight of what is important, like this school that reprimanded students for going to family vacation without realizing just how educational that vacation was.
One fourth grader named Francis Vann was given an assignment to write a persuasive essay about anything, Francis, who doesn't have a father in her life, wrote about not being able to attend the annual event. "Some fathers have passed away, others are away at war, and some fathers just don't care."
According to the National Fatherhood Initiative, one out of every three children in America lives in a home with an absent father.
She didn't expect to cause a stir, she was only expressing her feelings about not being able to go the dance.
Little did she know, her persuasive essay had persuaded her teacher, Jennifer Hancock.
Hancock brought Francis' essay to the attention of school faculty and something incredible happened.
"It turned into this huge change at our school," Hancock said. "It's a powerful lesson for all the students to see that they can be heard."
See how the school responded to one little girl's letter.
Please SHARE if you think this was a great change!
