Letters of Light: Teaching Middle Schoolers About Pediatric Cancer, One Card at a Time

For most middle schoolers, cancer is something they know only in fragments, pieced together from an overheard conversation, a sad movie or book, or a relative nobody fully explained. It tends to be something that happens to the adults around them, in rooms they aren't allowed into, or in hushed conversations after they have gone to bed. Letters of Light was built to change that, one card at a time.

Letters of Light is an Aid2Day program that teaches middle schoolers about pediatric cancer and asks them to use what they've learned: write cards for children in the middle of treatment. Led by Sahana Dhama, the Editor-in-Chief at Aid2Day, with support from co-founders Heera Santhosh and Kavya Ambati, the program ran through a partnership with the RAPP program at Tenafly Middle School in New Jersey. RAPP, short for Reaching All Peer to Peer, is the school's 8th-grade peer mentorship program, made up of students already trained to look out for their younger classmates. The cards they created were then sent to the pediatric oncology floor at Hackensack University Medical Center, their local hospital.

The choice to focus on middle schoolers was deliberate. Middle school is the exact window where a student's voice and sense of the world are still taking shape, where empathy is not yet a fixed trait and instead needs to be developed. For students, this program served as early practice in something classrooms rarely teach outright: how to sit with someone else's hard situation and respond with care instead of looking away. For the pediatric cancer patients and their families, a card made by another child is a small, tangible reminder that someone beyond the hospital is rooting for them.

The program unfolded over four weeks, closing with a final wrap-up session where students received certificates for their volunteer hours. Before a single card was created, students spent time learning the biology behind cancer and pediatric cancer specifically, the treatment options young patients face, and the many ways illness reaches into a child's life beyond their body. The goal was for every student to understand why the card mattered before making one, because any message created would be that much more meaningful when written with an understanding of how devastating cancer truly is. The cards were designed to be double-sided in Canva and then emailed to the hospital, which allowed nurses to print and distribute them while minimizing infection risk. The program adhered firmly to privacy laws, with no personal details of patients being shared.

By the end, more than 40 cards were sent to the hospital. Reflecting on this experience, one RAPPer said, "I liked creating little things to create a big impact on people who need some encouragement." Echoing this sentiment, another wrote, "I liked that we were able to make someone's day using the letters. It was nice to help those kids in some way, even if it was not directly." The impact was felt on the other end, too. A spokesperson from the hospital wrote, "Everyone who received the cards was surprised and had a huge smile! They all loved them!" Aid2Day thanks the staff of Hackensack University Medical Center and the inaugural class of the Letters of Light program for their effort throughout this endeavor; the program would not have been possible without them.

Looking ahead, Letters of Light is exploring ways to make each iteration more interactive, including expanding the program so students have the opportunity to create cards for nurses in pediatric oncology units, who are the people doing the invisible work of caring for these children, and who deserve to be seen as well. The larger goal is simple: continue expanding the program, reaching more students, and closing the distance between young people and the illnesses that shape the world around them. Every card is a bridge, and Letters of Light is only beginning to build them.

Take a look at some of the cards below!