It took three hours, plenty of packs of sticky notes, and a whole lot of handwriting, but the payoff was worth it. On Feb. 20, Branford High School (BHS) students and staff returned from winter break to find their school papered with 1,050 random acts of kindness, in the form of mini-notes of support stuck to every student locker and on each teacher's mailbox.

"I know a lot of teachers kept their notes, and a lot of students did, too.  People were surprised, but they were happy," said junior Sofia DeSorbo, a member of BHS Peer Connection, the student group behind the surprise. "Sunday [Feb. 17] was Random Acts of Kindness Day and we wanted to do something, so we wrote positive quotes and affirmations on sticky notes and we posted them on the lockers and teachers mailboxes."

You could call it a Kindness Project, but, as school psychologist and Peer Connection facilitator Cheryl Claise noted, "...we've been calling it the Post-It Project, because of all the notes they stuck all around the school -- 900 on student lockers and 150 on teachers' mailboxes. They came in on their day off to do it, and they actually wrote about 400 of the notes that day. It took three hours to post them."

However, the point of the exercise was certainly to spread kindness, Claise added. The extra-curricular Peer Connection group currently has about 40 members trained in areas including mentoring, tutoring and as greeters for new students.

Senior Sullivan Bono recently joined Peer Connection because she wanted to be part of a group that's supportive of other students at BHS. She says bringing her perspective as person who has struggled and made gains to overcome a movement disorder, dystonia, helps her to connect with students who may be encountering hurdles of their own.

"I've had it since I was five or six and I've made great strides," said Bono. "So I'm inspired to help other kids that are struggling not just educationally, but physically."

Peer Connection members also develop events and activities which help support a positive school climate at BHS like the Post-It project.

"The group is driven by our students, and as part of their Peer Connection activity they had the idea to do this random of act of kindness," said Claise. "Because the [national] day fell on our four-day break, they tried to come up with a way to welcome back students."

Senior Jillian Ciarleglio, who's now in her third year with Peer Connection, said the project definitely made an impact on students and staff as they entered the building on Feb. 20.

"Everyone was like, 'Oh, wow, they took the time to do this.' And I think that was the most beautiful thing about what we're doing here," said Ciarleglio. "This is a student-based community and we're allowed to come in and guide someone throughout the four years; it's not just a one-year thing. There's no reason to suffer alone when there's a thousand of us here going through the same thing. Just having an outlet to maybe voice what's going on, maybe voice some struggles, could definitely make one day that could feel a lot longer feel a lot shorter. I think it's a wonderful thing [and] to leave this kind of legacy is definitely a powerful thing. I'm grateful that I get to finish my senior year on a positive note like this."