It’s fun to check the National Calendar of Days, which this week includes “National Chocolate Covered Cashews Day” on Wednesday, April 21; National Jelly Bean Day on Thursday; National Talk Like Shakespeare Day on Friday (April 23 happens to be the Bard’s birthday); and National Pigs in a Blanket Day on Saturday.

Alloweth us obs’rve all of these dates of most wondrous imp’rtance. The National Day Calendar allows brands, non-profits and corporations to register a day, week or month to create special recognition. 

Some of the special days are about topics more serious than jelly beans. Wednesday is National Kindergarten Day, which honors the birthday of Friedrich Wilhelm August Frobel, the man credited with starting the first kindergarten. It’s serendipitous that on Wednesday Great Bend USD 428 will hold its first Great Bend Preschool & Kindergarten Pre-Enrollment Fair. That informational, come-and-go event takes place from 8 a.m. to noon and 3-8 p.m. at the Great Bend Events Center.

National days, weeks and months can create awareness and educate the public on countless topics. Therefore, it sometimes seems one of the main functions of local government is to issue Official Proclamations.

This is National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, and April is National Child Abuse Awareness Month, National Autism Awareness Month, and Sexual Assault Awareness Month. The list is much longer, but these are the observances recently noted by local proclamations. The reason these were chosen over, for example, National Fair Housing Month, was that local groups took the time to ask our county or city officials to make the proclamation. There are lessons to learn and projects to take on; at the very least, the proclamations show what is important to our fellow Kansans and remind us of what others are going through or the future they hope to build.

On that note, don’t forget that Thursday is Earth Day.