Seniors Spread Christlike Encouragement Through Annual Valograms Tradition
- 11 hours ago
- 2 min read
By Grier Herring, Shield Editor
As Valentine’s season approached, the senior class worked diligently to prepare Valograms for the North Raleigh Christian Academy community. This annual event, which also serves as a fundraiser for the class, is a way for the seniors to make everyone feel special by hand-delivering Valentine’s notes along with candy, flowers, or a song. Family and friends of NRCA students and staff order Valograms online in the weeks before Valentine’s Day for delivery in mid-February. With Feb. 14 falling on a Saturday, the seniors traveled through hallways and classrooms on Wednesday, Feb. 11, creating a close-knit community feeling throughout the school.
Behind the scenes, the senior class spent hours putting together the Valograms in Bible class and volunteering after school. Members of the Class of 2026 wrote handwritten notes to every elementary student to ensure each one was included in the celebration. This act of kindness carried a deep, missional goal for those who received the senior-written Valograms. Senior Jaxon Casheba said, “The elementary kids tend to look up to us…We want to encourage them to continue to be great friends to each other and be followers of Christ.” Valograms are an avenue to connect with younger kids, whom the senior class would not usually see, and influence their days in a small but meaningful way.
In the senior Bible classes, the students were assigned elementary students to write a personal note to. “It’s something so small that took us five minutes each to do that made a kid’s day,” said Casheba. Being able to share that moment with students fostered a cross-divisional bond that is only possible in a K-12 environment, connecting high school encouragers with elementary students.
From classroom to classroom, as seniors lost their voices from singing and ran out of breath from running, the Class of 2026 never lost their enthusiasm. Senior Izzy Harris said, “It was probably one of the highlights of my senior year because we got to tell everybody that someone loves them.” Handing a student a Valogram exceeded her expectations. Harris added, “Their faces lit up when they saw somebody wrote them something.”
Not only did the senior class visit students in their classrooms, but they also worked to make staff and faculty feel seen on this special day. Seniors stopped to sing impromptu songs for administrative staff, police officers, and substitute teachers, evidence that the love and gratitude in the NRCA community extends to all departments. Harris said, “It was a good experience to let them know that they’re appreciated and that we love and we see them.”
As the day ended and the last Valogram was delivered, it was clear that the impact went far beyond candy and flowers. What started as a senior fundraiser turned into a reminder of what makes the NRCA community intentional in love, encouragement, and connection across every grade level and department. The seniors modeled what it looks like to serve others with joy and excitement. In a season when graduation is quickly approaching, the senior class's Valograms deliveries stand as one more example of how this class chooses to lead with kindness in the community they are about to leave behind.
