On 5 September 2024, at Evan Hardy Collegiate in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, a 15-year-old girl was attacked in a school hallway. A classmate doused her with gasoline and set her on fire. Flames quickly spread over her head and body. Teacher Sean Hayes, 33, saw what was happening. He told a colleague to call 911, then ran to the girl and told her to get on the ground. He tried to roll her to smother the flames, but her backpack got in the way. He patted at the fire with his hands and realized his own clothes were burning. Hayes pulled off his shirt and used it to beat at the flames. He asked another teacher for a shirt and continued. When the school resource officer arrived and took over, Hayes grabbed a fire extinguisher and put out the remaining puddles of flaming liquid on the floor. The girl suffered burns over roughly 40 percent of her body. Hayes was burned on his face, neck, side, and hand. Both recovered. In 2026, Hayes received the Carnegie Medal for his actions that day. A teacher in a school hallway saw a student on fire and chose to put himself between her and the flames.

Nine-month-old Hamad arrived at a health centre in Taizz, Yemen, so weak he had gone a day and a half without eating or drinking. He was severely malnourished, dehydrated and suffering from vomiting and diarrhoea. His family had been displaced by the war. At the 22 May Health Center, nurse Intisar Hassan and the medical team began treating him with therapeutic milk, fluids and medication. They monitored him closely. The work wasn’t over after one treatment. Hamad needed continued care, day after day. A few days later, his diarrhoea had stopped. He was beginning to gain weight, and his family could finally breathe a little easier. There was no dramatic rescue. Just a sick baby, a worried family and health workers in Yemen doing the work that kept him alive.

Abdul Sattar Edhi slept on a bench outside his dispensary so people arriving in the middle of the night wouldn't find the door closed. In Karachi, he had started with a small shop offering free medical care to people who couldn't afford it. He didn't stop there. After a flu epidemic swept through the city in 1957, Edhi helped organize emergency medical camps. Later, he bought an old van, turned it into an ambulance, and drove it himself. That single van became the beginning of a nationwide ambulance network. With his wife, Bilquis, he also built maternity centres, shelters, orphanages and a system of cradles where people could safely leave unwanted newborns rather than abandon them in the streets. Over the years, nearly 20,000 children had Edhi registered as their parent or guardian. Yet the man behind the growing organization continued to live simply, in a small room beside its headquarters. When Abdul Sattar Edhi died on July 8, 2016, he left behind one of Pakistan's largest charitable welfare networks. It began with a small dispensary—and a man who didn't want anyone arriving after dark to be turned away.

At 17, Biar Kon was a Sudanese refugee in Nairobi, lost and unable to find the embassy. An older woman noticed him. She called him “my son” and asked if he needed food or shelter. Then she walked him one block to the right building. She may have forgotten that moment. He didn’t. Years later, in the U.S., Kon reflected on how that small act of kindness shaped the way he treated others. She didn’t change the world that day. She changed how one young man would move through it. Sometimes, kindness travels further than we’ll ever know. ❤️

With his wife, Bilquis, Abdul Sattar Edhi built maternity centres, shelters, orphanages and a system of cradles where people could safely leave unwanted newborns rather than abandon them in the streets.

After Haiti’s 2010 earthquake destroyed her livelihood, Marie Carole Boucicaut started cooking for 80 people who had lost so much themselves. Every weekday, she got up around 5 a.m. in Port-au-Prince to prepare 80 meals. Rice, beans, vegetables, sometimes meat and sauce. With help from her family, she packed the food into containers for people waiting to collect it. For one week, that meant doing it again every morning: buying ingredients, cooking for 80, and making sure her neighbors had something to eat. Marie had lost her own business in the earthquake. The community canteen, supported by Oxfam, helped feed vulnerable families and gave her a way to earn money again. She later put some of her weekly profits aside to rebuild her shop. She wasn’t just helping her neighbors get through a difficult time. She was finding a way for her own family to get back on its feet, too.

On a freezing night in the Andes, volunteers went looking for a man who hadn’t reached his mountain refuge. On August 25, 2026, Juan Martín “El Chino” Crespo, 28, became lost while heading toward Laguna Ilón in Argentina. His companion raised the alarm. The Comisión de Auxilio of Club Andino Bariloche joined the search as heavy snow and torrential rain swept the mountains. Rescuers worked through the night in below-freezing temperatures, following clues and using a thermal-imaging drone. At around 10:30 the next morning, they found Crespo alive near the Manso River. The team includes volunteers who give their time to help people in trouble on the mountain. That night, their work brought one worried community the news it was waiting for. Some acts of kindness happen far from the spotlight, in weather most of us would stay indoors to avoid.

When a landmine left her husband unable to work, Trần Thị Hạnh had two children to support. The family lived in Quảng Trị, central Vietnam, where unexploded weapons from the war remained buried in the land around them. Her husband had been collecting scrap metal when a mortar fuse exploded. Shrapnel injured his hands, eyes and chest. He could no longer earn a living. Hạnh became the family’s main breadwinner. Then she made an unusual choice. She joined a recruitment program run by Mines Advisory Group, training to work in landmine clearance. After completing her training, she returned home. A few months later, MAG offered her a job. She accepted. The work was dangerous and demanding. But Hạnh knew what an explosion could do to a family. She had watched it happen to her own. “I love this work and will serve MAG until the end,” she said.

At 4 a.m., Rajaa Musleh was still beside a little girl who had been badly burned. Rajaa, a nurse working with MedGlobal in Gaza, had been caring for the child at Al-Shifa Hospital. The girl’s injuries were severe, and she was losing her sight. At some point during that long night, the child asked Rajaa a question: “Do you see me?” Rajaa told her yes. She stayed with the girl until 4 a.m. The child later died. There was no operation that could undo what had happened to her. No promise Rajaa could make that would change the outcome. But for those hours, the girl was not left alone. Rajaa was there to care for her, to answer her, and to make sure someone was beside her when she needed it most. Not every act of care ends in a recovery. Sometimes it means staying with someone when there is nothing left to promise.

For four days, Catherine thought she was going to die. In 1993, 18-year-old Catherine Conteh was in labor at a hospital in Freetown, Sierra Leone. Her baby was stuck. Doctors said she needed an emergency Caesarean section, but Catherine and her husband, Augustine, couldn't afford the surgery. Without payment, there would be no operation. Then a New Zealand nurse named Aly Hall heard Catherine crying. Aly was volunteering with Mercy Ships and visiting the maternity ward. She went to Catherine's bedside, prayed with her, and learned that roughly $100 could save both mother and baby. Aly's fellow volunteer, British anesthetist Dr. Keith Thomson, heard what was happening and offered to pay for the surgery himself. The operation went ahead. Catherine survived. So did her daughter, Regina. Thirty years later, Catherine and Aly reunited in Freetown. By then, Catherine had become a nurse. So had Regina. Looking back, Catherine said that one decision had saved an entire family.

The man had escaped an execution. Mina Jahić decided to hide him. In 1992, during the war in Bosnia, Ferid Spahić escaped from a group being taken to be executed near Rogatica. He reached a neighbor’s garden, badly beaten and covered in blood. The neighbor went to Mina Jahić. Mina told her to bring him to her house after dark. Mina knew the danger. Armed men were searching for him, and one Serb neighbor even came to her home claiming he was looking for a lost sheep. She hid Ferid in the attic. He had to remain completely still and silent because people downstairs could hear movement above them. Mina lived there with her husband and four sons. If Ferid was discovered, her family could be in danger too. She kept him hidden for about a month, until he could safely leave. Years later, when asked why she did it, Mina gave a remarkably simple answer: He was a human being. He needed to live. In 2011, she was formally recognized by the U.S. State Department for saving his life. What would you risk to protect a stranger?

At 7 p.m., Leonardo Simoza climbed aboard a river ambulance to take a pregnant woman to hospital. They were in Venezuela’s Orinoco Delta, where some Indigenous communities are reached more easily by river than road. The woman was in poor condition, and the crew decided not to wait until morning. They started back through the dark. By 11:30 p.m., there was no time left to reach the hospital. Simoza, a firefighter and paramedic, helped deliver the baby aboard the moving ambulance. The baby was born breech. Then Simoza felt something unexpected. There was another baby. He told the mother: “You have another baby.” At 12:03 a.m., the second child was born. The two babies were handed to their grandmothers, one after the other, as the ambulance continued toward medical care. For communities scattered along the Orinoco's waterways, an ambulance isn't always a road vehicle. Sometimes, it's a boat moving through the darkness.

For more than 20 years in Dubai, Julieta Solas worked as a nurse—and spent her free time caring for other Filipino migrants. Julieta arrived in the UAE in 1984 and began working as a staff nurse at Rashid Hospital. Over the years, she moved through several departments and eventually became the unit-in-charge of the pediatric department at Latifa Hospital. But her work didn't stop when her shift ended. For two decades, Julieta also led the St. Mary’s Filipino Community in Dubai, organizing activities and leadership programs and volunteering whenever medical teams were needed. She understood that migrant workers needed more than medical care. Many were far from their families, dealing with loneliness, stress and difficult working conditions. Julieta organized community gatherings and recollections to give them somewhere to turn. She was also involved in medical missions that brought care to people who needed it. Western Union recognized her in 2015 as one of its Heroes for Better, honoring Filipino migrants who used their time, skills and resources to help others. She came to Dubai to work as a nurse. She stayed for decades helping people who were far from home.

Anke Gowda spent most of his working life buying books he couldn't afford to keep for himself. He grew up in a farming family in Karnataka and started collecting books while working as a bus conductor. Later, he became a timekeeper at a sugar factory. For decades, a large part of his salary went straight into books. He sold property to keep the collection growing. Eventually, the books filled his home. So many that they needed a building of their own. That became Pustaka Mane — “House of Books” — in Mandya, Karnataka. Today, it holds more than 2 million books in over 20 languages, including literature, science, history, philosophy, rare manuscripts and thousands of dictionaries. Students, researchers and ordinary readers can use the collection for free. Gowda doesn't charge a membership fee. He and his family have continued looking after the collection themselves. In 2026, India awarded him the Padma Shri for a lifetime spent collecting and making knowledge accessible to others. He spent his life building a library he wished he'd had growing up.

Dr. G. Venkataswamy wanted cataract surgery to work more like an assembly line, without sacrificing quality. In 1976, he founded Aravind Eye Hospital in Madurai, India, with 11 beds. His idea was simple but radical: make eye surgery affordable by treating large numbers of patients efficiently, while using what paying patients contributed to help subsidize care for those who couldn't afford it. Aravind built standardized surgical teams, efficient patient flow and outreach eye camps that brought patients in from rural communities. The system became known for high-volume, low-cost cataract surgery. Then the model began traveling. In Kenya, ophthalmologist Dr. Amos Kibata experienced Aravind's system during training in India. He later founded City Eye Hospital in Nairobi, adapting the model to Kenya with low-cost care, cross-subsidization and community eye camps. Similar Aravind-based programs followed elsewhere in Africa. In Ghana, Dr. Judith Simon built the Northern Community Eye Network around the same principles. Venkataswamy didn't just build an eye hospital. He built a system other surgeons could take home.