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The Hessel Family Foundation Welcomes FOX 13 Tampa Bay to The Kingdom of Kindness

On Thursday, July 30, we had the chance to welcome a guest into the Royal Kingdom of Kindness.

Regina Gonzalez of FOX 13’s Tampa Bay Live joined us live for a few minutes in the middle of the ball. For a few minutes, viewers across Tampa Bay joined us as well.

Near the end of every Kind Camp, the room stops looking like a summer camp. The tables get dressed. The campers arrive in their good clothes. A week of practicing how to greet someone, how to sit, how to give a firm handshake and keep eye contact with visitors, and how to say thank you, turns into an actual evening. Sharri Cagle, Executive Director of the Hessel Family Foundation, met Regina on camera in full royal dress, with the whole kingdom going on behind her.

A Proper Hello

What happened next is the part worth keeping.

Cagle turned the camera on the campers and asked them for a proper hello. Dozens of girls in dresses stopped, faced a television host they had never met, and curtsied. Then they showed her their twirls. Across the room, the boys were seated as lords, learning to tie a tie and button a suit jacket, waiting to escort everyone to the tea.

They had earned it. All week the campers had worked on greetings, posture, how to set a table, and what to say once they were seated at it. Thursday was the day they got to use it, and this year they got to use it in front of their whole community.

“We have all our little ladies,” Cagle told Gonzalez. “They are practicing their curtsy, how to sit, their posture, how to properly dance.”

What Tampa Bay Saw

Behind the dresses and the curtsies is the reason the camp exists.

Kind Camp brings together children with special needs; whether they’re on the spectrum, are diagnosed with a learning disability, or illness, and their typically developing peers for two weeks, with no phones for big and little buddies to learn social and life skills at camp. Every younger camper, a Little Buddy, is matched with an older student, a Big Buddy, for the full week. The pairing is the whole program.

“At Kind Camp, we want to give every child a platform to know that they have a purpose to serve, to give back, and to connect with others,” Cagle said.

Asked what the pairing does for the older students, she pointed years down the road. “We’ve had big buddies share their story, that they had never been around children with special needs. They didn’t know how to act around children with special needs, and this gave them the opportunity to learn about it, and how it’s changed their lives. And these are big buddies coming back eight years later that still share those stories.”

“Everybody has a story,” she said. “Sometimes people have a very different story, and no matter what, we just need to share kindness.”

The Power of 10

Regina also got to hear what the campers had been doing with their tenth anniversary challenge. Every camper received ten dollars from the Hessel Family Foundation and one instruction: spend it on somebody else, then come back and tell everyone the who, what, where, when, and why.

They took it to a veterinarian’s office, a foster closet, and a hospital. One group left camp that Thursday evening and drove to the airport to hand out ‘BE KIND’ stickers and wish travelers happy trails.

“They are so excited to do it and come back and share what they did,” Cagle said, “and we’re hoping that’s contagious, and it carries on, and it just spirals out in our community.”

Thank You, Tampa Bay

A camp like this happens in one room, for two weeks, in front of the families who show up. Getting to open that room to the rest of Tampa Bay, live, is a rare thing. Thank you to Regina Gonzalez and FOX 13’s Tampa Bay Live for spending a few minutes in the kingdom with us, and for letting a few hundred children show the city what they had been practicing all week.

Watch the Segment

Get Involved

Kind Camp returns next summer. To support the Foundation’s work or to get involved, visit hesselfoundation.org. The Foundation’s gala takes place November 7 at an airport hangar and will include a mini fashion show featuring children with special needs.

About the Hessel Family Foundation

The Hessel Family Foundation is dedicated to building inclusive community experiences that empower children of all abilities. Through programs like Kind Camp, the foundation fosters empathy, lifelong mentorship, and hands-on philanthropy across the Tampa Bay area.