Austin Peay State University was among 300 other colleges and universities to participate in Delight-ful, a nationwide event to challenge students to perform 500,000 random acts of kindness on February 17.

Chartwells Higher Education, a leader and food service partner at APSU, created Delight-Ful as part of a year-long campaign, Joy-ful, that has welcomed and celebrated students being back together safely.

Chartwells treated students to an iced coffee bar, cookies, giveaways from local business and donated food swipes as part of a food insecurity give-back.

Emily Rittenhouse, a senior at Austin Peay is one of the several students who enjoyed lunch in The Caf during Delight-ful. 

“A random act of kindness could mean anything and is as simple as listening to someone when they are having a rough day”, explained Rittenhouse. “Life is tough but know that there are people willing to listen and if you need help there are resources but also talk to people who love you and support you.” 

Akira Bolton, a junior at APSU, describes a random act of kindness as words of affirmation.

“Randomly telling someone ‘have a nice day’ or giving a compliment to someone can go a long way” said Bolton. 

Over 300 campuses participated in the signature event and uploaded the details of their Delight-ful event to a tracking tool. This tool included a tally of the total number of random acts of kindness on each respective campus according to Corey Choate, Senior Director of Dining Services. 

In combined efforts from students and Chartwells, APSU was able to achieve their goal of 1000 random acts of kindness.