Kait’s Angels teach local schoolchildren about empathy with new Buddy Bench

Samantha, 9, is a fourth grader at Aquebogue Elementary School who was feeling sad yesterday, worrying that she had no friends. That’s when Ja’dah, also 9, stood right up and said, “I’ll be your friend,” said Phil Kent, principal. “It just took about three seconds.”

Kent told the story yesterday at two assemblies at the school, one with third and fourth graders, the other, for children in grades K through 2, to mark the dedication of a new “Buddy Bench” in memory of Kaitlyn Doorhy, a young Mattituck woman who was struck and by a car while away at college last year.

The Buddy Benches, said Kait’s mom Darla Doorhy, will be installed in her daughter’s memory memory at each elementary school on the North Fork, including Southold, Greenport, Aquebogue, Oysterponds, New Suffolk and Riley Avenue. The first was installed at Cutchogue East last November.

Mary Lou Araneo spoke to the children yesterday, explaining Kait’s Angels, the not-for-profit organization that is donating the benches was organized to keep Kait’s mission of doing good work and acts of kindness alive forever.

The bench will be placed near the playground, and students who are feeling lonely, or are having a hard day and need a friend, can sit there, so that others can come and lift their spirits, much as Kait’s Angels is uplifting so many with good works, Kent said.

“Kait left our lives too soon and we have been tested by her loss,” Araneo said. But while there is an empty chair, “her presence is still strong” among those who love her and celebrate her life every day, she said.

Kait’s Angels encourages people to find their value, and to be a force for good in the world. At her funeral, William Araneo, who delivered Kait’s eulogy, said she was a force, and that force lives on today, his wife said.

It’s important to her parents that Kait’s memory helps children to learn to live their lives to the fullest, to be a friend to those who need one, to take a stand against bullying, to go sit on the Buddy Bench, if they see a fellow classmate who could use a boost of kindness, Kent said.

Children asked questions, including what they should do if too many kids sat on the Buddy Bench at once. Kent told them that the whole process of making a friend could take seconds, so they wouldn’t need to be sitting on the bench alone for long.

“What if you’re sitting on the bench and no one comes to be your friend?” another child asked.

Kent said that adult teachers would be there to help. He also said that at Aquebogue, while the children might not be best friends, the spirit of respect and kindness, and the sense of acting together as a team, would ensure that no child would be left on the bench; he was certain students would step up to be their friend.

Xiomara White, who teaches third grade, said students will also alert staff if a child is feeling alone; that very thing happened yesterday when the kids told her that one boy said he thought maybe no one liked him. They all gave him a group hug, she said.

The Buddy Benches, Doorhy said, are a perfect way to share her daughter’s love for helping others: According to the Christian’s Buddy Bench website, which created the idea, “The buddy bench is a simple idea to eliminate loneliness and foster friendship on the playground. Let’s spread the message of inclusion and kindness.”

The students at Aquebogue Elementary watched a short video on Christian’s Buddy Bench before yesterday’s assemblies.