Amid a time of contentious politics and tremendous loss due to the ongoing novel coronavirus pandemic, human courage endures and is worth celebrating—in fact, says Kerry Kennedy, acknowledging those making change and making hope is more important than ever.

As the daughter of Ethel Kennedy and the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy explains to PEOPLE, honoring those making a difference demonstrates that change is possible with “just one person.”

And that one person can create a ripple for countless others.

Held Thursday, the 2020 RFK Ripple of Hope Award ceremony honored Dr. Anthony Fauci, Dolores Huerta, Colin Kaepernick, Dan Schulman, and Dan Springer—five civic and business leaders who, according to a press release, exhibited courage in their “pursuit of racial and economic equality, social justice, and civil rights.”

In an interview the morning after the event, held remotely out of coronavirus precautions, Kerry said she was “elated” at the gala’s success.

“I felt like it was a revival—a much-needed revival meeting after the struggles that all of us have had in 2020.”

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