The Heart of This
Born from survival.
Built for every child
who needs the words.
Donna didn't study the problem of children growing up without books,
without language for their feelings, without anyone to tell them
their dignity had worth.
She was that child.
She grew up in a community shaped by war. She walked on landmines to collect firewood on mountain borders. She fetched water in buckets for miles. She did not have a single book.
When she finally got off the boat and arrived in a new country — alone, starting over, holding almost nothing — her first act was to create. She sat down and drew a book by hand. It was about a small Chinese boy who was lonely, who one day befriended a mouse, and slowly discovered he had a secret superpower.
That superpower was simply being himself.
That book was Kind Rebel before Kind Rebel had a name.
Children today know how to name their feelings.
But most don't know what they stand for.
Schools have invested deeply in emotional wellbeing — in gratitude, mindfulness, self-regulation. All of it matters. But there is a gap that almost no curriculum addresses: the space between how a child feels and who a child is becoming. Between managing emotions and acting on values. Between inner life and moral courage.
Donna saw this gap everywhere. In classrooms. In workshops. In the eyes of eleven-year-olds who could articulate their anxiety but couldn't tell you what they stood for. She had a name for it: values displacement.
She knew the feeling personally. At thirteen, Donna stepped off a refugee boat and entered a detention centre. When she finally walked through the gates and into a mainstream school in Perth, she carried with her everything she had survived — but no framework to make sense of it, no language to name it, no community that reflected it back. She was not just geographically displaced. She was displaced from her own values. From the sense of who she was and what she stood for. That kind of displacement, she discovered, is the quieter crisis — and the harder one to name.
"Australia feels safe. But it lacks values. I want to raise children with internal values — not just external safety. Children who are kind. Inclusive. Aware when others are struggling. Who speak up. Who are not followers. Who are true to themselves."
— A Kind Rebel parent, Sydney 2026Donna brings to Kind Rebel a life that is the curriculum.
- Human rights lawyer — systemic understanding of dignity, equity, and access at institutional scale
- Peace scholar — field-level conflict resolution and peacebuilding methodology
- Activist — community trust, movement building, grassroots advocacy
- Author — published IP, narrative craft, values-led content for all ages
- Speaker — paid platform across schools, corporations, and global stages
- War survivor — lived inside the problem she is now solving
Donna believes kindness is not a personality trait. It is a deliberate act — the choice to protect someone else's dignity, especially when it costs you something.
She believes peace is not something that happens to you. It is something you build, every day, in every room you walk into.
And she believes that children aged 11 to 16 — right now, in this window — are forming the values that will govern how they lead, love, and live for the rest of their lives. Kind Rebel exists to be present in that window.
A social enterprise. A movement. A book.
A workshop. A community.
A superpower for every child who needs one.
Our books are values-led, science-informed, and designed for every age from four to adult. They centre on values and identity, helping children understand what they stand for and who they are becoming. They explore lived values like kindness, courage, fairness, and belonging, while gently guiding children through real experiences such as bullying, identity, and inclusion. Drawing from cultural wisdom and human rights, our books connect children to something bigger than themselves — community, responsibility, and the wider world — so they can grow into grounded, thoughtful, and compassionate people.
Our #IAmKindRebel workshops give young people the space to stand up, say who they are, and mean it. Our school programs embed values into everyday learning — not as an add-on, but as the foundation.
And our annual Peace Summit will bring global leaders, educators, and young Kind Rebels together for one day of honest conversation about the world they are inheriting — and the one they intend to build.
Kind Rebel exists to close the gap between how children feel and who they become — by giving every young person a values-based identity strong enough to withstand the noise of the world.
In ten years, one million young people across the world will know who they are, what they stand for, and that kindness is the bravest thing they will ever do.
We are keeping children safe on the outside.
But who is helping them become strong on the inside?
Australia is at a turning point for its young people. Social media has been restricted for under-16s, leaving a real void in how young people connect, form identity, and find community. Twenty-seven percent of Year 4 to 9 students face regular bullying. The Australian Government has committed $10 million to address it. And across schools, parents, and communities, the same question keeps surfacing.
Young people today are growing up faster, under more pressure, and with less guidance on what actually matters. Peer pressure, identity confusion, online influence, and the slow erosion of community — these are not abstract trends. They are the daily reality of children aged 11 to 16 right now, in classrooms across Australia and around the world.
The tools exist to keep children safe. What does not yet exist — at scale, with lived authenticity, with rigour — is the program that teaches them who to be.
That is the gap Kind Rebel fills. That is the work Donna started the day she got off the boat and drew her first book by hand. And it is the work that will not stop until every child who needs those words has them.