Submitted Photo Silver Creek Superintendent Dr. Katie Ralston, left, and District Clerk Emily Cole, right, are pictured with Tom Murphy, Founder of Sweethearts & Heroes.

SILVER CREEK — One of the most impactful guests the Silver Creek Central School District has welcomed in recent years returns to the district on Tuesday to teach students and educators how they can keep activating compassion and empathy in their classrooms and beyond.

Pat Fish, of Sweethearts & Heroes, will be in the Silver Creek Central School District on Tuesday, Jan. 7 to begin work on the BRAVE System. The work will continue each week through Feb. 11.

BRAVE is a K-12, self-directed leadership program designed to connect middle and high school students with elementary students. BRAVE uses the power of human connection, acceptance and behavior modeling to teach upper-level students how to become Sweethearts & Heroes. In turn, those upper-level students can teach elementary students — and each other — specific bully drills that will help change their school culture.

Sweethearts & Heroes’ central team of traveling presenters includes Tom Murphy, Director and Founder; Pat Fish, BRAVE Program Director & Circle Specialist; and retired U.S. Army Sergeant Rick Yarosh, a HOPE expert, Purple Heart recipient and motivational speaker who was burned severely while serving in Iraq.

Sweethearts & Heroes aims to prevent hopelessness, bullying and suicide by providing dynamic, inspiring content that centers on the human interaction skills necessary for schools and other organizations to change all aspects of their culture — skills such as empathy, compassion and teamwork.

“We know that we have to practice these things — just like Stop, Drop and Roll and other drills — so that we can put those skills to use when we need them,” said Murphy.

Sweethearts & Heroes weaved Circles with Silver Creek students last fall and also worked with Silver Creek students and educators during the 2023-2024 school year.

During this school year, Sweethearts & Heroes started offering Train the Trainer, which teaches current educators how to weave their own Circle trainings for future hires; and STEP (the Student Teacher Empathy Program), which teaches high school students how to present Sweethearts & Heroes’ signature assemblies for students in grades K-2 and 3-5.

For more than 16 years, Sweethearts & Heroes has presented what Murphy calls “‘the ‘stop, drop and roll’ of bullying” to more than 2.5 million students in school districts from New England to Hawaii and north into Canada. Sweethearts & Heroes also tailors its presentations and workshops for businesses, non-profits and civic groups. Murphy said, “We go where we’re needed. That’s what heroes do.”

For more on Sweethearts & Heroes, follow Sweethearts and Heroes on Facebook or visit sweetheartsandheroes.com