The $20 Challenge: How a sister’s legacy sparked a movement of kindness
Kristina Ulmer’s fall semester class was the most recent to participate in the $20 Challenge.
When Kate Amodei dreamed of joining the Peace Corps as a child, she embodied a spirit of service that would eventually inspire hundreds of acts of kindness — though not in the way anyone could have anticipated. Her journey toward helping others took several turns, from exploring a career as a registered dietitian to finding her calling as a paramedic. But in 2014, just as she was applying for EMT positions, Kate’s life was cut short by a tragic car accident.
Among her belongings was a rolled-up wad of cash from her morning shift at a restaurant. For years, this money remained untouched in a cabinet, a bittersweet reminder of unrealized dreams. Then her sister, Kristina Ulmer, an English teacher at Hatboro-Horsham High School, found a way to transform this painful reminder into something beautiful.
The catalyst came in fall 2018, during a classroom discussion about empathy in Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Ulmer saw an opportunity to connect literature with real-world impact. She exchanged Kate’s restaurant earnings into $20 bills and presented her students with an unexpected challenge: use this money to spread kindness in Kate’s memory.
What began as a classroom initiative has blossomed into a movement that captures Kate’s compassionate spirit. Students have demonstrated remarkable creativity in their approaches to giving back. Some have learned to crochet to make hats for premature babies in the NICU, while others sewed specialized equipment for stroke patients. One group used their $20 as seed money to bake and sell cookies, ultimately raising enough to cover a shelter dog’s adoption fee.
The ripple effects of these actions spread throughout the community. Students cleared library fines for peers. Others started an annual tradition of distributing donuts to strangers, spreading joy through simple gestures. Some honored veterans by placing American flags on their graves, while others addressed crucial needs by donating feminine hygiene products to local shelters.
Even during the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, the movement persisted. To date, 351 acts of kindness, representing $7,020 in distributed $20 bills, have touched countless lives, with an average of 25 students participating each semester.
The profound impact of this initiative extends beyond the immediate recipients of these kind acts. It demonstrates how tragedy can be transformed into triumph, and how small gestures of goodwill can create lasting change. Through these actions, Kate’s dream of making a difference lives on — not through grand gestures, but through the cumulative power of individual acts of kindness that continue to ripple through the community she left behind.
In a world often overwhelmed by complexity, Kate’s legacy reminds us that positive change often begins with a simple choice to help others. Her story lives on not just in memories, but in the countless lives touched by the kindness she inspired.