Airedale AOK – our Acts of Kindness campaign

Airedale Hospital and Community Charity launched the Acts of Kindness (#AOKAiredale) campaign in October 2021. The campaign began with an aim to spread kindness throughout the local community including colleagues of Airedale NHS Foundation Trust.

Research shows that being kind to others can be beneficial to our own mental health. Helping others feels good, it brings us a sense of belonging and helps us to keep things in perspective. That’s why Airedale Hospital & Community Charity created the campaign.

Kindness month

The initial campaign was a huge success, with colleagues completing their own random acts of kindness and using the #AOKAiredale resources to spread kindness throughout the Trust and wider community.

The charity team encouraged people to be kind and carried out their own acts of kindness. For example, the charity sent encouraging messages to colleagues, posted kindness quotes and tips on their social media, left surprises around the hospital and community sites for people to find, and held a tombola where staff could get a free prize to give to a friend. The team also worked with the Trust’s dedicated staff clinical psychologist to create a video and blog post about the importance of kindness and self-compassion.

The charity provided useful resources throughout the campaign, including a kindness calendar; a gratitude journal template; kindness bingo; and ‘pass it on’ cards (to be given out when an act of kindness is completed, so the recipient can pass on the act of kindness).

Campaign developments

Since then, the charity has continued the campaign and taken it further out in the community, speaking about the importance of kindness at open days, community events and school assemblies.

World Book Day

World Book Day has become an annual event for the charity team and local schools have been chosen for a random act of kindness donation consisting of health-related books for the school libraries for the past four years.

In 2025 we decided to reach out to our wider community by asking for additional nominations through our social media channels. Over 100 nominations were received for schools from the local area and five were randomly selected for the donation.

Laura T and Carla visited Cowling Primary School, Skipton Parish Community School, Wharfedale Montessori School, Haworth Primary School and St Josephs Catholic School to spread the World Book Day joy.

AOK Wellbeing Grants

In November 2022, the charity launched the AOK Wellbeing Grants for the colleagues of Airedale NHS Foundation Trust.

Anyone employed by the Trust has been invited to apply for a small grant of up to £1000 to purchase items that would benefit their team’s wellbeing. Applicants would then present their ideas in a Dragon’s Den style event where a panel made up of their peers would decide on the approval of the application. A high percentage of the applications were approved as long as they fit with the charity objectives and guidelines.

Since launching, almost 80 applications have been approved funding various items to assist Airedale NHS Foundation Trust’s colleagues with their wellbeing and lifting their mood at whilst working.

The 2025 Wellbeing Grants are now open for applications and Airedale NHS Foundation Trust colleagues can find all of the information they need on our charity AireShare page.

Where we are now

The AOK Airedale campaign is now part of the charity’s core offering. The charity team has plans to continue spreading kindness and positivity within the local community and further afield.

The Menu of Poems, launched in October 2024 has allowed the charity to add to the wellbeing offering for patients, visitors, colleagues of Airedale and the local community.

If you would like to take on a personal or group act of kindness challenge then get in touch, we’d love to hear your ideas and support you with sharing the kindness further afield.

To continue spreading the kindness, we need your help! If you can help us to carry out one act of kindness every day then we can create a domino effect: one act of kindness leads to another. If we’re all doing an act of kindness and inspiring others to do the same, imagine the effect it will have on our community!

Resources

The charity can provide #AOKAiredale packs for your school/college/nursery and community groups to use. We are also more than happy to attend assemblies or talks to help inspire kindness in the younger generations. Get in touch with us to kick start the kindness conversation.

The packs include:

Pass it on cards
Gratitude templates
Colouring sheets