PORT BYRON - Rachel Scott had a vision.

A 17-year-old attending Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. in 1999, Scott believed that if people went out of their way to show kindness and compassion to others, it would start a movement unmatched by any other.

Scott was the first person killed in the Columbine school shooting 10 years ago, a victim of the very hatred she spent her young life fighting against.

Though the site of the worst school shooting in the nation's history is 1,600 miles away, a program Scott's father established to continue his daughter's work brought the tragedy home for a group of children in Port Byron last week.

Sitting in the auditorium at Dana L. West Jr.-Sr. High School in Port Byron last Friday, middle school students - many of whom were only toddlers at the time of the shooting - listened to Cody Hodges of Rachel's Challenge, who introduced the children to Scott's life and challenged them to make a positive impact on the world.

A couple weeks after Scott's death, Hodges said, her father was in her room and found a piece of paper stuffed underneath the boxspring of her bed. What he pulled out was an essay she wrote that year titled “My Ethics, My Code of Life.”

“I had this theory,” she wrote, “where if one person could go out of their way to show compassion, that it would start a chain reaction of the same. People will never know how far a little kindness can go.”

And that was the message Hodges instilled in his audience, asking them to adhere to five challenges that would make the world a better place, the first of which is eliminating prejudice.

“The best way for you, for me, for all of us to eliminate prejudice would be by simply looking for the best in other people,” said Hodges, a native of Texas who met Scott's brother Craig a few years ago.

Hodges told the students within the Port Byron Central School District to dream, to set goals.

“Every one of us can be great,” Hodges said. “Every one one of us can make a difference if we want to.”

He asked them to choose positive influences, use kind words and finally, start a chain reaction.

“Our lives will impact those around us,” he said.

Tammy Harris, 13, of Cayuga, said she and her classmates already feel the impact of Scott's message.

“I feel it's a good idea for her to start this,” she said, “because it will make people better than who they were.”

Assistant principal Betsy Primo said she first heard about Rachel's Challenge when she served on the Fayetteville-Manlius School District Board of Education.

She knew it was a great program and brought it to Port Byron, where she is finishing up a one-year post.

“At this age they struggle with what they want to do and peer pressure is difficult,” she said, “so I thought if we gave them a positive message, they will then make good choices.”

That will especially hold true with Harris, Cassandra McIntyre, 13, of Weedsport, and Cody Wiers, 14, of Sennett.

“People shouldn't bully other people,” Harris said.

The lesson McIntyre is taking out of it is to simply “be nice, be a friend.”