By ALIN HETT
Hays Post
Christie Brungardt, a Hays educator who co-founded Jana’s Campaign after her daughter Jana was tragically killed by an ex-boyfriend in 2008, was nominated as one of 10 L’Oréal Paris Women of Worth honorees for 2026.
Jana’s Campaign is a nonprofit that works to prevent relationship violence by teaching young people about healthy relationships and how to recognize warning signs of abuse.
The annual Women of Worth program recognizes nonprofit leaders for their community work, giving each honoree selected a $25,000 grant, mentorship and a national platform to share her cause. Brungardt said while she is honored, she'd rather have something else.
“I would give all of it away if I could have just had my daughter back,” Brungardt said. “Since I know that can’t happen, it means so much that people have recognized the work that we’ve all been doing. We didn’t start out doing it for an award, but we have worked extremely hard at it.”
The recognition is meaningful to Brungardt not only as an acknowledgment of the campaign’s work, but also as a way to honor her daughter.
“It feels good to know that this was the same kind of work that Jana did before her death,” Brungardt said. “To know that we can continue her work feels good, and that she, in some ways, is being recognized as well.”
Continuing Jana's work
Jana was 25 and had just completed her first year at the University of Kansas School of Law when she was killed by her ex-boyfriend on July 3, 2008. Before her death, she had volunteered and worked with domestic and sexual violence organizations in Lawrence.
Brungardt and her husband, Curt Brungardt, founded Jana’s Campaign in 2009. Both were leadership studies educators at Fort Hays State University. The couple first worked on state legislation, then spent several years figuring out how the organization could make the greatest difference.
They eventually focused on prevention education for young people, a continuation of work Jana had done herself.
“She’d worked, volunteered and worked both in the domestic violence agency in Lawrence and the sexual violence agency in Lawrence,” Brungardt said. “This was the work that Jana did.”
Jana’s Campaign now delivers evidence-based programs for K-8, high school and college students. The lessons address domestic and dating violence, sexual abuse, stalking, healthy relationships and social norms.
Brungardt said teaching young people about leadership helped shape her and her husband's decision to take action. In leadership studies, she and Curt taught students to look at their homes, schools and communities to identify what needed to improve, and consider how they could help create positive change.
She said the decision to build the campaign was clear, even as she and her husband had to work out how to do it.
“It was just how we were going to go about it, and where our niche would fall,” she said.
Having conversations early on
Brungardt said the campaign’s work with students taught her that prevention conversations need to start younger than she first expected.
A sixth-grade teacher once told her that if the campaign wanted to address relationship violence, it should start in sixth grade. At the time, Brungardt thought the students were too young for those conversations.
“I was so naive about all of these issues at that point,” Brungardt said. “I thought, ‘Oh, you can’t talk to sixth-graders about these things.’”
But students in sixth, seventh and eighth grades told her they wished the campaign had reached them sooner.
One sixth-grade boy told Brungardt his younger sister was in third grade and already dealing with some of the issues being discussed.
Brungardt said the conversation changed how she thought about the campaign’s work and led her to do more research into ways to adapt the lessons for younger children.
“I had to do a whole bunch more learning and a lot more research and figure out ways that we could do the same work, but we just have to do it in different ways and use different languages,” she said.
The campaign has worked with students as young as kindergartners, though its focus is primarily on middle and high schools and college campuses. Brungardt said students in middle school are already beginning to think about relationships and where they fit in.
She said the earlier young people learn what healthy relationships look like and how to recognize warning signs of unhealthy ones, the better prepared they will be as they grow older.
“The sooner that we can start talking to them about the positive things, and also what are the warning signs of unhealthy relationships, the better it’s going to be for them and for their futures,” she said.
Starting in Kansas to becoming national
Jana’s Campaign began in Kansas, where Jana and her parents were from and where the Brungardts had spent their lives. Brungardt said the organization has since worked in 46 states as schools and other groups around the country sought its programs.
“It feels big,” she said of representing Kansas on a national stage. “We’re a small organization, but we do great big things, and we just keep plugging along, doing our great big things.”
Brungardt said it is difficult to see how widely the need for prevention education extends, but she is glad the campaign can help address it.
“It’s sad to me that it is so desperately needed, but I’m glad that we’re there to fill that void,” Brungardt said.
Expanding the work
Brungardt said Jana’s Campaign plans to keep providing prevention education to as many middle and high school students and college students as it can reach.
One goal is to add more prevention educators so the organization can serve more schools, including by placing educators in different parts of the country.
The organization also wants to expand its virtual work. Brungardt said Jana’s Campaign cannot physically travel to every school or community that requests help, so it plans to create more online awareness campaigns.
“We are going to create more videos, more awareness campaigns about all of these issues that we can provide virtually,” she said.
The campaign also provides training for community organizations. Brungardt said it has worked with prisons, businesses, churches and youth nonprofits, and she hopes to offer more of those training in the near future.
One area she said she wants the organization to focus on is private businesses. Brungardt said employers may not understand how domestic, dating and sexual violence can affect their workplaces, or how to prepare if violence occurs within an organization.
The campaign is scheduled to host a community training in Hays on Oct. 21. Brungardt said Jana’s Campaign hopes to continue offering workplace training and helping more organizations understand the issues.
“People around the country can help us by helping us get into their schools to talk to their young people,” she said. “We will just keep providing prevention education.”
Brungardt directed people interested in learning about Jana’s Campaign and the 2026 Women of Worth honorees to WomenOfWorth.com.