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How do protesters choose their leaders? In Shelby, North Carolina, it happened with a simple question at the end of a Black Lives Matters march. After an evening of "no justice, no peace" chants, the people looked at 27-year-old Alexsis Vinson and asked, "When's the next one?"

Vinson hasn't stopped organizing since that spring night, nor have hundreds of new activists in cities large and small across America. They are students and car salespeople, moms and musicians, all angered by the killing of George Floyd and emboldened to speak long-unspoken truths about the injustices in their own communities.

USA TODAY Network reporters and photographers spent time this summer listening to protest leaders in 12 small- to mid-sized cities. For each leader, spring and summer have become an unexpected journey of discovery - about their cities' painful histories of racial oppression, about present-day inequality and about their own potential to inspire and lead.

Their stories reveal how ordinary people can become empowered to do extraordinary things. And next year, the USA TODAY Network will revisit all 12 young activists to see how they've fared, what they've learned and how sustained the fight for racial justice might turn out to be in varied American communities.

For now, Shelby's Vinson talks of America's most renewable resource - hope.

"I have crazy stupid dumb faith," she says. "Things can get better and things will get better, and it starts with us."

Jazmine Brooks' talk at a prayer vigil inspired a protest, and a big neon sign of Stonewall Jackson went forever dark.

Fourteen-year-old Maisie Brown didn't understand why people were so upset about her state flag. Eighteen-year-old Maisie Brown? She's organizing protests for racial justice.

Jalen Elrod celebrates the rich legacy and lasting importance of historically Black neighborhoods, and he's leading the fight to save them.

As a high schooler, Ayana McCuller's anger over Michael Brown's death in Ferguson, Missouri, fueled her entry into activism. Now, McCuller works to show others there's room for everyone in this movement.

Arlette Morales was in kindergarten when a police officer racially profiled her family. Now she's equipped to help fight for the kind of vulnerable child that she once was.

As a car salesman, Andrey Rosado takes sealing the deal seriously. Now he's trying to sell his hometown on the project of a lifetime: achieving racial justice.

People knew Joshua Shaw from seeing the music producer playing instruments in church, hosting parties and bringing people together. But when he joined his county's first protest after George Floyd's death, he truly found his voice.

He is one-third of a gospel rap group, a man of steadfast faith - and the unexpected face of his city's peaceful protest in the wake of George Floyd's killing.

At a school where Black students only make up 8% of enrollment, they found a space, and a need, to start speaking out. Now they hope this town keeps listening.

Alayssia Townsell's organizing work is inspired, in part, by her 9-year-old brother. He wishes he could change his skin color so he doesn't have to worry about being a target of violence. She wants to change that reality.

A religious experience at a young age left Alexsis Vinson with a sense of purpose and calling that led her first to preach in the streets, and now, following Floyd's death, to lead in the streets.

At first, he felt numb. But after joining in demonstrations after George Floyd's death, he's changed: "I'm literally not the person I was two months ago."

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Heart of the movement: How these 12 young activists are seeding change in their towns

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How do protesters choose their leaders? In Shelby, North Carolina, it happened with a simple question at the end of a Black Lives Matters march. After an evening of "no justice, no peace" chants, the people looked at 27-year-old Alexsis Vinson and asked, "When's the next one?"

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When he was growing up, Julian Dowell says, his mom was a big advocate for reading up on racism in American history. "In the eighth grade I was reading Cornel West. Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow had just come out," he says. "So when Trayvon Martin occurred, I was actually kind of in my school mobilizing people around me, like, yo, we're gonna do a day where we're all going to wear our hood up."

Today Dowell is a junior Georgetown University, studying African-American studies and thinking about adding economics. But his biggest interest is understanding augmented reality technology - and finding a way to use it as a tool to protest and speak out.

"Even in this moment, you see a lot of rallying cries behind George Floyd. But mind you, Breonna Taylor's death was, what, three months ago? So it was really important for me as a black man to say how can I amplify this quotable of, 'say her name,' " he says. "More often than not, black women don't don't receive that opportunity."

Before he visited the newly named Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., he created an app that allowed people in the plaza to use their phone to find a mural of Breonna Taylor, shot by police in her home in Louisville, Ky. When you click on the image, you hear Taylor's mother speaking about her.

"I wanted people to say her name. I wanted people to hear her mother's voice," he says. "I didn't want to dehumanize her in the way that her death had. I want to humanize or I want to memorialize her."

At the same time Dowell is wrestling with the idea of what it means to be a student activist, he's also asking himself: "What are the limits of the virtual world?"

There have been instances of social media influencers using the Black Lives Matter protest movement as a photo opportunity. There are posts of influencers posting in front of looted stores or coming to a march with hair and makeup done only to take a picture. Social capital, he says, is a real thing and many people want to be on the right side of history.

The solution, he says, is nuanced and complicated and won't be solved in just talking about the issue of systemic racism and performative activism. Another thing Dowell is fighting for when he protests is making sure the right people have access.

"Lean into technology companies. Give black and brown communities access to resources. Give them access to free Code Academy. Send them links to free code camps. Make sure there's pipelines for opportunities for students," he says, to find access to workshops that teach people computer coding and developing apps.
Aaron Narraph Fernando, 19, New York City
Aaron Narraph Fernando, born and raised in Queens, New York, is a rising junior at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan, where he studies law and society. He's also running unopposed for a local Democratic Party position called County Committee. And in his spare time he's been making waves in New York City politics armed with just a Google Doc and a Twitter account.

"A few weeks ago, even before the George Floyd protests started, I started looking into fundraising numbers for state-level candidates. I was curious to see how challengers were doing against their incumbents in terms of fundraising. And I started noticing that a lot of these so-called progressive Democrats were taking a lot of money from these very conservative police unions and other law enforcement things like correction officers' unions and the court officer unions. So I started making a list of all the different law enforcement unions and also how much money they had given to different New York City Democrats this cycle."

While contributions from unions to Democratic politicians might have raised few eyebrows in the past, Fernando and other activists saw this money, and the influence it brings, as standing in the way of measures like the recently passed repeal of Section 50-a, a law shielding the personnel records of police officers. He started making a list of law enforcement unions' political contributions to New York City Democrats.

"And I wasn't really sure what to do with the list until the George Floyd protest really started. And we started seeing more and more people be aware of the very aggressive role that police take in our communities. And a lot of people started to ask me how they could take action if they couldn't go out and protest in the streets."

"I tweeted out, I asked people if this is a good time to drop my spreadsheet showing which New York City officials are taking money from law enforcement. And I got like 800 'likes' in like an hour. So I was like, OK. People really care about this. They're really engaged right now. They really want to get involved and know how they can make a difference. So I posted my spreadsheet."

Then, something surprising happened. Politicians started responding to public pressure.

"Aravella Simotas, an assembly member in Astoria [donated her law enforcement contributions to racial justice organizations] under pressure from her primary challenger. Then all the dominoes fell...Today we've had 19 different elected officials in New York City say they're going to donate their money to anti-racist causes. And so far, we've had almost $60,000 in law enforcement contributions donated to anti-racist causes. And I think we'll see more and more in the coming weeks."

Fernando is quick to say that he thinks direct action in the streets is the most powerful way to make change, and to downplay his own contribution.

"I'm not the first person to talk about the power that this money can have. People in criminal justice spaces have known about this for a long time. I'm just somebody who compiled that data to an easily accessible spreadsheet." And sometimes that is all you need.
Kinsale Hueston, 20, Los Angeles
After organizing on campus for two years, Kinsale Hueston has had to get creative. As a student at Yale University, her approach to amplifying marginalized voices is generally through art - she's a nationally recognized poet. And as COVID-19 took hold in the Navajo Nation, she found that her Instagram posts and reposts were getting a lot of attention: "It's made me really happy to see friends of mine who have never really shared anything about native issues - or anything like that before - amplifying what I've been sharing."

Hueston is an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation who mostly grew up in California. In high school, protest movements around the missing and murdered indigenous women's movement as well as the Dakota Access Pipeline, "helped [her] get involved at the local level, especially with the urban native community in L.A."

She started using social media back then to educate and raise awareness on these issues, but she says this time is different: "Usually what I face is like not a lot of reposts, not a lot of response. But now because people have been kicked off campus and they have to go online in this specific scenario, they're looking for these opportunities to learn."

And her approach is working. She's gained almost 12,000 Instagram followers in the past 30 days. She posts primarily about the high rates of COVID-19 on the Navajo reservation, but she recognizes that there is another huge movement rippling through the country right now. Both, she says, focused on the same thing: "You can't put one issue over the other because that's what, you know, the white state wants us to do. They want us to fight like this. And instead we have to be good relatives to each other and listen to each other and address the needs of all of our communities right now."

She had one final message: Don't forget the artists.

"There are so many incredible black singers, visual artists, writers who are making such incredible work to bring joy right now. And I think that's also such an important part of movements, is the healing and the beauty that can come out of it. I think art is so important because it allows us to see the future that we want to manifest and work towards."
Amiri Nash, 18, Washington, D.C.
Amiri Nash, who will be starting as a freshman at Brown University, has been watching people "perform Internet activism." They'll re-post something, comment or change their profile picture to a black screen, but "have a false sense of engagement with the cause and the movement and the idea."

So Nash and a friend, Lexi Brown, started a project called Sign of Justice, an organization that creates signs with scan codes, to post in public places that are predominantly white. (One sign, for example, says, "A man was lynched by police. What are you doing about it? Text 'Floyd' to 55156. Use your privilege for good.")

"It brings conversations to communities and it really gets you out of your house and doing something," Nash said. One of the best parts: "You can do it while social distancing."

The signs have QR codes with resources, including a link to donate to the Black Lives Matter movement. Before the police involved with George Floyd's murder had been charged, a sign displayed a number that you could text that would automatically sign a petition to get them charged. The signs are traveling across the world - through England, Germany, the Netherlands and Canada.

The signs are another way to fight for change and an acknowledgment that protesting could be a luxury during a pandemic. "There are still some people that have immunocompromised systems that aren't able to protest, or people that just have COVID fears in general, which is completely valid," he says.

Millions of people around the world - from New Zealand to Iran - have taken to the streets, and while Nash is positive about the visibility of these demonstrations, he says it's too soon to celebrate.

"Right now, I'm hopeful because I've seen so many people get involved. I've been seeing so many people go to protests and hang signs and spread awareness. But also I don't want the hope to block the very real reality that none of this really matters unless we hold everyone accountable, unless we get real systemic change, unless the police officers who murdered George Floyd and Breonna Taylor are actually convicted and spend time in jail."
Ayesha Chaudhry, 16, Mason, Ohio
As an immigrant from Pakistan, Ayesha Chaudhry has a unique perspective on America's racial divisions.

"I'm so, so, so grateful for the life that America has provided me. But it's because I'm so grateful for that life that I'm willing to fight for America and willing to fight for American citizens' liberties and making sure that they're, you know, living in a place that they love."

After George Floyd's death, she teamed up with some of her best friends - all teenage girls who met in AP government class - to organize the Black Lives Matter march in the Republican-leaning Cincinnati suburb of Mason, Ohio. The peaceful protest was four blocks long, and honored other victims of police killings, as well as the recent murder of a black transgender woman, Riah Milton, in nearby Liberty Township during an attempted robbery.

Chaudhry said the turnout, and all aspects of the day, left her feeling full of gratitude.

"A lot of people doubted the organizers. We are all young girls. I kept telling people that I know Mason [residents] had it in them. And I was just - I was really grateful to be proven right."

In her spare time, Chaudhry runs a nonprofit media company that presents makeup looks for all skin tones, and she does makeovers and photo shoots for underrepresented people, such as gay couples. She has an Instagram feed, a Youtube channel, and a podcast, too, all under the name "Your local brown girl media." But her dream job, she says, is to be a lawyer for the ACLU.

She says there's something big that people get wrong about this current wave of youth and student activists - that they're somehow anti-America.

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'I'm Willing To Fight For America': 5 Student Activists On Protesting For Change - MindShift

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When he was growing up, Julian Dowell says, his mom was a big advocate for reading up on racism in American history. "In the eighth grade I was reading Cornel West. Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow had just come out," he says.

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This website highlights stories from around the globe that detail how everyone, big and small, can work to make the world a better place.

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TakePart is the digital news and lifestyle magazine from Participant Media, the company behind such acclaimed documentaries as CITIZENFOUR, An Inconvenient Truth, and Food, Inc. and feature films including Lincoln and Spotlight.

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This text from takepart.com, explores actions and initiatives being taken bu young people to address the growing environmental issues.

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Young people have a unique relationship with the environment: They are often the first affected when something goes wrong, yet the least represented when decisions are made.

They, more than any other generation, have been raised to feel a responsibility toward the environment. And that's important because they will be the first generation in charge of correcting the problems caused by the widespread pollution of the atmosphere and rampant misappropriation of natural resources.

Youth today feel the "clock is ticking in terms of the amount of time we have to deal with the major issues like clean air, clean water and global warming," says Sharon Smith, program director of Brower New Leaders at the Earth Island Institute, a support group for youth environmental campaigns and initiatives.
Growth in activism
Smith has seen firsthand the growth in environmental activism. "I graduated from college in 1999, and right in my first year out of college I went to an eco conference, which at that time was held in the Northeast. It was one of the largest environmental youth conferences held to date, and it had about a thousand people."

Contrast that with a 2009 conference that drew 12,000 young people from all 50 states, she said. "You can really see the growth of the environmental movement even over the past decade by looking at these conferences and the trainings designed and led and initiated by young people."

Canon Envirothon has seen similar growth in youth activism. A nonprofit specializing in the delivery of environmental education for high school students, the program has grown from three states in 1988 to 54 states and provinces in North America today.

Young people are "looking for avenues where they can make a difference and become knowledgeable, and then they can take and share that knowledge and experience," said Clay Burns, executive director of Canon Envirothon in Mississippi. They need to be "willing and prepared to work toward achieving and maintaining a balance between the quality of life and the quality of the environment."
Raising new leaders
But an increase in youth activism is not enough to stave off environmental peril - we need new ideas and new leaders, according to Eban Goodstein, economics professor at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Ore., and co-director of the 2009 National Teach-In on Global Warming, a nationwide network of teachers at all educational levels that, on Feb. 5, engaged more than a million Americans in a "solutions-driven dialogue."

Eban says the U.S. must act aggressively in the next year or so to reduce global- warming pollution and invest in clean energy technologies or "you guys are going to be looking at a very different world in 2050," when the world will be 3 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit higher.

"To put that number in perspective, during the last Ice Age, it was only nine degrees Fahrenheit colder than it is on average today," he explained.

Goodstein says youth need to move beyond being the front lines of environmental activism to being the visionaries. Both the Brower New Leaders and Canon Envirothon have devoted more than two decades training them to do just that.

Earth Island Initiative was founded in 1982 by renowned environmentalist David Brower to support young people who have new strategies for saving the earth. In 2000, the organization started the Brower Youth Awards, which honor six youth ages 13 to 23 each year for their leadership and activism with a gala ceremony, campout and $3,000 prize.

"We felt like young people so often are sort of the workhorses of these campaigns and aren't always recognized, aren't always supported at a critical time in the development of their careers, in the development of their activism," Smith said.

The Canon Envirothon also honors young environmentalists in a yearly competition that engages more than 500,000 high school students throughout North America. The Envirothon works in partnership with local conservation districts, forestry associations, educators and natural resource agencies to organize and conduct competitions on the local, regional, and state and/or provincial level. This year's hands-on problem-solving competition is Aug. 2-6 at the University of North Carolina at Asheville, where local finalists will compete for recognition, scholarships, and prizes.
Issues addressed
While recycling clubs abound at all age levels, more and more youth are expanding their efforts in other directions. In Massachusetts, young people involved in Gardening in the Community promote organic gardening and bicycle use. In Florida, a young man developed an interactive curriculum to educate youth about the plight of loggerhead turtles. In California, youth helped pass a bill requiring cosmetic companies to alert the Department of Health if their products contain carcinogens.

These are just a few examples. Youth across the country are cleaning up local wetlands, shutting down toxic waste sites, promoting clean energy and combating landfills. They have educated their peers, parents and the public on carbon emissions, reusable goods and conservation of resources.

Brower New Leaders have dealt with many such issues, and the Earth Island Institute currently oversees 60 projects, ranging from "Project Coyote" to the "Sacred Land Film Project," in 26 countries worldwide.

Students involved in Canon Envirothon pay special attention to natural resources, specifically those related to soils and land use, aquatic ecology, forestry and wildlife.

"Conservation is the big thing that we're involved in," Burns said, explaining that such work is more grassroots, and thus a more viable venue for youth activism.

And while most youth activism is local, many are entering the political realm to effect long-lasting change.

"There's a recognition that this is a time when we need major action from government if we're going to sort of lay the foundation and give you guys the tools that you're going to need to transform the world," Goodstein said.
New worldview coming?
Goodstein envisions a day soon when people automatically think about the environmental impact of their actions before they act. "We'll move on to a phase where we just sort of naturally mimic nature and create things that are in harmony with nature and don't produce waste and pollution."

Smith shares his optimism because she's seen the changes enacted by the youth involved in her program. "Just this year we were looking at the past 10 years of awardees, and at least 87 percent of our award recipients are still in leadership roles in the environmental movement. So it's a great sign that these young folks were committed when they applied to do this work and that hopefully the support we provided ensured they could stay committed and rise as leaders," she said.

The presidency of Barack Obama gives more reasons for hope. "It's rejuvenated the environmental movement in a number of ways," Smith said. "People have been really hitting their heads against the wall for eight years trying to push forward environmental initiatives."
Click here to read these Y-Press profiles:
Grind for the Green, San Francisco, CA
Urban Roots, East Austin, TX
West Oakland Urban Students Uprising against Pollution, Oakland, CA
Click here to read how students at two high schools are recycling and promoting environmentalism.

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Researchers from the United Negro College Fund went to West Virginia last year and asked 62 high school dropouts in the federal Job Corps program a simple, open-ended question. ¨What was it about school,¨ they wanted to know, ¨that caused you to quit?¨

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This article from Time Magazine for Kids, is about Malala's heroic journey of healing after being shot by the Taliban for advocating for gender quality in education

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This article from Time Magazine for Kids, is about Malala's heroic journey of healing after being shot by the Taliban for advocating for gender quality in education

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This article is about Greta Thunberh, the young lady who had made environmental protection her cause

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This article is about Greta Thunberh, the young lady who had made environmental protection her cause

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Greta represents an important global trend.

Greta Thunberg, the young climate change activist from Sweden, was named Time magazine's 2019 Person of the Year-a potential symbol of one of the biggest trends of 2019. At 16 years old, she has become the pioneer and symbol of a youth movement that is spreading across the globe.

Greta's road to activism is quite literally a depressing one.

According to Time, Greta's climate obsession began when she was 11 years old. She fell into a "deep depression" with periods of "endless sadness" after a class about the effects of climate change. She couldn't reconcile how the planet could be in such danger and yet no one was prioritizing the issue. During this period, she barely spoke or ate. She came close to hospitalization due to the malnutrition that has stunted her growth.

This excessive reaction is a hallmark characteristic of Greta's Asperger syndrome. Asperger's is often characterized by an inability to understand social cues and an intense or obsessive interest in one specific subject. Individuals with Asperger's see the world very literally and have trouble understanding humor, sarcasm and irony. Time says this is her greatest asset. "She dislikes crowds; ignores small talk; and speaks in direct, uncomplicated sentences. She cannot be flattered or distracted. She is not impressed by other people's celebrity, nor does she seem to have interest in her own growing fame. But these very qualities have helped make her a global sensation."

To help her overcome this depression, Greta's parents encouraged her to take action. In August 2018, Greta began skipping school to strike alone outside the Swedish Parliament. And since her lone protest went viral, she has become a media sensation and an almost global hero.

But what the media as a whole refuses to report is how this young girl has been exploited. Contrary to early reporting, it is no accident that Greta's protest made headlines. The founder of the social media platform "We Have No Time," which posted Greta's first protest online, didn't happen to stumble across Greta as first believed. In fact, Ingmar Rentzhog had met Greta's mother three to four months beforehand and was notified of the lone protest a week before it happened by another climate activist. Rentzhog's Facebook post of Greta's lone protest quickly went viral.

Ever since, Greta's vulnerabilities continue to be exploited. In her article "The Weaponization of Western Children," Melanie Phillips wrote:

What was so distressing was to see this very vulnerable child's anguish and rage at the world's failure to put modernity itself into reverse, in order to combat a supposedly unstoppable apocalypse for which no plausible evidence whatever exists but over which nightmarish vision she and countless others are being terrified out of their wits by worthless or outright fraudulent studies which they have been led to believe constitute "settled" and unchallengeable science ... and through which bogus emergency they are being used and manipulated to create global hysteria.

The coverage Greta has received is akin to worship. The Time article naming Greta "person of the year" stated:

[Greta] emerged as a standard bearer in a generational battle, an avatar of youth activists across the globe fighting for everything from gun control to democratic representation. Her global climate strike is the largest and most international of all the youth movements, but it's hardly the only one: Teenagers in the U.S. are organizing against gun violence and flocking to progressive candidates; students in Hong Kong are battling for democratic representation; and young people from South America to Europe are agitating for remaking the global economy. Thunberg is not aligned with these disparate protests, but her insistent presence has come to represent the fury of youth worldwide.

Time credits her with not only the surge in climate protests, but also many other youth movements around the globe. And in it, she has earned the admiration of the rich and powerful. This teenager has been worshiped by and become a sort of moral guide for scholars and world leaders alike. Time continued:

In the 16 months since [her first lone protest], she has addressed heads of state at the UN [United Nations], met with the pope, sparred with the president of the United States, and inspired 4 million people to join the global climate strike on Sept. 20, 2019, in what was the largest climate demonstration in human history. Her image has been celebrated in murals and Halloween costumes, and her name has been attached to everything from bike shares to beetles. Margaret Atwood compared her to Joan of Arc.

Actor Leonardo DiCaprio said that Greta, and the young people she has inspired, "set an example of true leadership that we so desperately need right now." Prince Harry said that every country, community, school, friendship group and family "needs their own Greta-someone who can lead the way ...."

This 10-year-old is leading the fight against climate change in Colombia - on the streets and in the Senate.

Like Greta Thunberg - Francisco protests for immediate climate action every Friday. pic.twitter.com/Vdk5w9vKKP
- AJ+ (@ajplus) January 4, 2020

The praise by these celebrities and leaders is the embodiment of an end-time prophecy in Isaiah 3: "As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths" (verse 12).

This is an exact description of our society today. Children are rising up to oppress us and women are increasingly leading in our homes, in our nations and in every facet of society. And the vast majority of people are not only passively tolerant toward this phenomenon, but are actively promoting its rise.

In the language of the Time' s article: "She is a reminder that the people in charge now will not be in charge forever, and that the young people who are inheriting dysfunctional governments, broken economies and an increasingly unliveable planet know just how much the adults have failed them." Greta has "become the voice of millions, a symbol of a rising global rebellion."

This is the exact fulfillment of Isaiah 3! Children are rising in rebellion and oppressing the populace.

And leaders are acting as if these children have become their moral guides. French President Emmanuel Macron said, "When you are a leader and every week you have young people demonstrating with such a message, you cannot remain neutral. They helped me change." Hillary Clinton said that Greta's UN speech should be required viewing for every lawmaker. Former president of Ireland, Mary Robinson, said that when she would talk about the effects of climate change it would fall on deaf ears, but "having children say, 'We have no future,' is far more effective. When children say something like that, adults feel very bad." Guardian columnist Jonathan Freedland wrote: "Children skipping classes to take the moral lead is an indictment of adult complacency."

We have reached the "apotheosis," or climax, of "St. Greta," as the Spectator sarcastically put it.

What we are seeing is a complete reversal of the roles God established in family and society. It is being turned upside-down. Children are now ruling over adults who simply bow down in submission.

In his book The Missing Dimension in Sex, Herbert W. Armstrong wrote, "Few people stop to realize to what extent the teenagers have taken over. They pretty well dominate the world picture. Isaiah foretold this day."

But as Mr. Armstrong brought out in a World Tomorrow radio broadcast, this phenomenon is primarily the children's fault: "That 90 percent of the youth problem is irresponsibility of parents and the main trouble, my friends, is that we do not teach respect for authority. ... God Almighty is the Supreme Ruler of the universe, and we have the kind of teaching that doesn't want to acknowledge any authority, doesn't want to obey; submit to any obedience. We don't like to submit to law." Further in the broadcast, Mr. Armstrong said that there is "nothing more important in life to learn than respect for authority and obedience."

God blames parents for what these children are doing. The parents have failed in their duty to discipline their children and teach them respect for authority.

This upside-down society is not the way God intended it to function. The government God established is ultimately about learning to submit to God as our supreme authority. For more information about true government, read Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry's booklet God's Family Government.

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Greta represents an important global trend. Greta Thunberg, the young climate change activist from Sweden, was named Time magazine's 2019 Person of the Year-a potential symbol of one of the biggest trends of 2019. At 16 years old, she has become the pioneer and symbol of a youth movement that is spreading across the globe.

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This article spotlights a teen who is finding ways to reuse and recycle e-waste (computers and other electronics) as well as lobbying the legislature to pass bills requiring this type of recycling.

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This site highlights young people who make a difference.

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This site highlights young people who make a difference.

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What Kids Can Do combs the country for
compelling examples of young people working with adults in their schools and
communities on the real-world issues that concern them most.

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n a political climate where most adults are inert with despair, a growing number of teenagers are responding with action. After 14 children and three adults were massacred at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, it was students - not parents, teachers or political representatives - who organised themselves to campaign for changes to US gun laws. The March for Our Lives demonstration in Washington, DC on 24 March was accompanied by sister marches around the world: millions of young people supporting each other and demanding policy reform. Lead campaigner Emma González, a high-school student who now has more than 1.5m Twitter followers, made a call to arms for her peers to: "Fight for your lives before it's someone else's job."

González is one of many teenagers shattering the stereotypes of the lazy, entitled, self-obsessed millennial. More and more teenagers are noisily questioning the world they're inheriting and demanding things work differently. Here, we meet some of the young activists whose voices are increasingly impossible to dismiss.

Last spring, I was watching the news when there was a report on girls in the UK missing school because they couldn't afford menstrual products. Some were using toilet paper, newspaper or socks. Thinking about girls my age going through this hit me hard. The report gained attention, but I felt the government was sweeping it under the carpet and we needed to pressure them to do something. So I did what felt normal to me and went online and started a petition. It calls for free menstrual products for children on free school meals. I didn't imagine even getting 100 signatures. But in between revising for AS exams, I emailed as many people, companies and universities as I could. I asked my parents to send it around their work. My dad was a bit reluctant at first, but he did.

There's huge embarrassment about periods, but it's something half the world's population will go through for a week every month. That it's a taboo holds us back in achieving gender equality. Within two weeks, the petition reached 2,000 signatures. Comments were divided between people being shocked that this happens and others saying it affects them or their friends. Hearing that made me want to fight harder.

When the general election was announced, I emailed the parties. The Green party and Women's Equality party both replied and included a pledge in their manifesto. I was so frustrated I couldn't vote. Then in December we organised a protest outside Theresa May's bedroom; more than 1,000 people came and shouted. To date, 150,000 people have signed the petition. It's sad when adults are surprised to hear a young person being politically vocal. Young people are angry about the state of the world and a lot of us use social media to articulate that. I get asked to speak a lot.

The other morning, a TV station sent a car to school, I left for an hour, spoke on the issue and came back to a history lesson. My parents are supportive and as surprised as me that this has taken off. My dad went with me to the Women's March, which was cool. But sometimes my mum can get annoyed if I'm doing lots of campaign stuff with exams coming up.

If someone tells me I should be in school right now, I know that they don't see the bigger picture. Earth's ability to support human life is falling apart and if things don't change in the next five to 10 years, nothing's going to matter.

I'll finish high school, but right now this is the most important thing I can do with my time. Myself and 20 other kids are currently suing the Trump administration for violating our constitutional rights for failure to act on climate change. We originally launched it against the Obama administration a few years ago. The US government has known the fossil fuel industry is having a negative impact on our climate, yet they have been offering them subsidies and opening up land to exploration. We have just heard that we are going to trial in October.

I'm also involved in law actions and civil disobedience to stop fracking around my hometown of Boulder. In 2012, my friends and I successfully helped push for a five-year ban.

From a young age, I was aware of my part in protecting our planet. I was three or four the first time I went on a protest, and six when I started speaking at them. I was born in Colorado and have spent a lot of time in Mexico. My entire childhood was travelling, hanging out in nature and learning about my family's indigenous heritage. My dad taught me that we have a responsibility to protect the Earth the way that our ancestors did.

I've spoken at the UN about my work. I was surprised how disrespectful, disconnected and sterile it was. The delegates were on their phones, not listening. They perked up when they heard I was just 15 years old. The power of me speaking wasn't for them but for the millions of people my speech has since reached online.

The world is seeing how powerful young people are and how things are going to change. Adults on CNN and in the United States specifically, they can argue and cover gossip about Trump and his hair and porn stars. But young people are mobilising on the streets.

There's so much power in what's happening within our generation. We don't have the respect we deserve, but I think it's coming.

I've been racially abused since about 12, but it was never seen as an important thing to tackle. At secondary school, white children called me disgusting things, but teachers would turn a blind eye. And not just to racism, but sexism, homophobia, transphobia. There's also internal racism in the Eritrean community. My dad is called names because he has darker skin. It all comes from preconceived ideas that black is less, or the darker you are the lower you are in terms of income, society and politics.

Because these problems weren't taken seriously, I normalised them. But when I moved to a sixth form where the majority of students are black girls, I was surrounded by political and social consciousness. The more educated I got, the angrier I became. Last summer, I joined an organisation called the Advocacy Academy and, with a small group of people my age, we launched a campaign challenging the image and under-representation of black people in the media. We recreated iconic posters, such as Doctor Who, Titanic and Harry Potter, and made all the characters black. The campaign is rooted in personal experiences and I've gone from talking about things with my friends in the lunch hall to speaking about them nationally.

The Academy has revolutionised the way I think. Back in the day I definitely upheld toxic masculine identities. I'd tell myself that I didn't cry. Challenging gender norms wasn't of interest to me because I wanted to fit in with my friends. But I've learned to let go of my ego and be vulnerable so I can say what's on my mind. It's allowed me to take all the cold anger I have built up over years and turn it into something good. I've learned to become an ally to many other issues that don't affect me directly.

After university, I don't just want to get a really good job, buy a big house and forget about my community. I want to change something and challenge the status quo.

Even before the war in Syria, I wanted to change society, but I knew I needed to get educated to do that. Back then, we had a normal life. We went to school every day and saw our friends. The war started when I was 11 or 12. Going to school became difficult. There were people fighting on the ground, there would be bombing, sometimes bullets. Sometimes school was just closed because of budgets. My father is a teacher and he lost his job.

We left Syria five years ago, when I was 14. I was so worried about my future and education. We went to a refugee camp in Jordan. I didn't expect there to be a school, but I was happy to discover a caravan with a tent and some teachers. There was no electricity. We studied computing from a book. In the winter, it got so cold it was hard to focus on the teacher.

But school gave me hope. And I started to encourage other girls and boys to go, too. I would walk from tent to tent, caravan to caravan, persuading kids and parents. I met people who thought that because we are refugees, education isn't important any more, or that they'd continue school when they returned to Syria. I encouraged people to believe in themselves and not give up. I met kids who'd never been to school, and girls who saw marriage as their profession. Some parents told me it had nothing to do with me. I fought hard for everyone to believe that we can't do anything without knowledge and got involved with international charities who supported me.

What's happening in my country is not of our making and it's not our fault that we're losing our rights. One day, we'll be able to return, and we need to have knowledge. After three years in Jordan, my family came to the UK. Last year I became the youngest and first refugee Unicef Goodwill Ambassador. I'm now on my way to university and am doubling my activism.

I came out at 14. When you're a young LGBTQ+ person and you come out, you're put in this position where you are suddenly expected to educate your peers. I'd be in a lesson and someone would ask me an incredibly inappropriate question. People feel like they have permission to access all of you when you're still figuring things out for yourself.

At the same time, someone in my class was sending me online anonymous, violent messages, telling me to kill myself. My school didn't know what to do with it. At one point, they had contacted my parents, pushing me to come out to them, too, and it all became detrimental to my mental health.

I don't come from a political family, but I've always had a strong sense of fairness. After coming out, I started making educational YouTube videos on LGBTQ+ issues and people watched them. I also worked with my school to establish support systems and visibility for LGBTQ+ pupils. I got together with teachers to set up a group. We held events and assemblies, and suddenly others wanted to join. I worked with the school to run surveys of the staff and students, so we knew the issues that needed addressing.

As part of a Stonewall youth programme, I started a YouTube series called Queeries. I invite anyone to submit questions, however inappropriate or silly, and I sit down with another LGBTQ+ person and we answer them. Part of that is creating space for difficult questions, but also to give others a platform. I am very aware of the fact that I am white, middle-class and able-bodied, and there are a lot of things I feel I can't speak to. I have been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and autism, but campaigning is always something I've felt able to do.

I was happy to do the work with my school, and I know that education resources are stretched, but schools shouldn't rely on pupils to affect change. That puts pressure on young people to challenge things adults should be addressing.

Many young people think they aren't going to amount to anything because of all the headlines we read. But that's designed to discredit our concerns about how the world's being run. A lot of people in control are invested in the world as it currently stands; to suggest that things aren't great the way they are scares them.

We are going to be the kids you read about in textbooks. Not because we're going to be another statistic about mass shooting in America, but because we are going to be the last mass shooting. Just like Tinker v Des Moines, we are going to change the law. And it's going to be due to the tireless effort of the school board, the faculty members, the family members and most of all the students. The students who are dead, the students still in the hospital, the students now suffering PTSD, the students who had panic attacks during the vigil because the helicopters would not leave us alone, hovering over the school for 24 hours a day.

If President Trump wants to tell me to my face that it was a terrible tragedy and how it should never have happened and maintain telling us how nothing is going to be done about it, I'm going to happily ask him how much money he received from the National Rifle Association.

It doesn't matter because I already know: $30m. And divided by the number of gunshot victims in the United States in the first one and a half months of 2018 alone, that comes out to being $5,800 each. Is that how much these people are worth to you, Trump? If you don't do anything to prevent this from continuing to occur, that number of gunshot victims will go up and the number that they are worth will go down. And we will be worthless to you.

To every politician who is taking donations from the NRA, shame on you. The people in the government who were voted into power are lying to us. And us kids seem to be the only ones who notice and call BS. Companies trying to make caricatures of the teenagers these days, saying that all we are is self-involved and trend-obsessed and they hush us into submission when our message doesn't reach the ears of the nation, we are prepared to call BS.

Politicians who sit in their gilded House and Senate seats funded by the NRA telling us nothing could have been done to prevent this, we call BS. They say tougher guns laws do not decrease gun violence. We call BS. They say a good guy with a gun stops a bad guy with a gun. We call BS. They say guns are just tools like knives and are as dangerous as cars. We call BS. They say no laws could have prevented the hundreds of senseless tragedies that have occurred. We call BS. That us kids don't know what we're talking about, that we're too young to understand how the government works. We call BS.
This is an edited transcript from the speech student and activist Emma González gave at the anti-gun rally in Fort Lauderdale on 17 February 2018, three days after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida

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'Young people are angry': the teenage activists shaping our future

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Fed up with waiting for the older generation to sort out its problems, a growing number of teenage activists are taking matters into their own hands. Here, six motivated people reveal why they've decided to fight for a better world

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Meet the inspiring teenagers shaping the future they want to see

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From anti-corruption activists to gun control pioneers, young people all over the world are refusing to be downtrodden.

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Spencer Platt/Getty Images, Twitter, Vivien Killilea/Getty Images for Teen Vogue

Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swedish climate activist, sparked a massive online response when she delivered a scathing speech at the United Nations General Assembly to shame leaders from around the world for their inaction on climate change.

Though Thunberg's brazen comments to the leaders marked a pivotal moment for youth involvement in climate change advocacy, young activists have been bucking the norms for years to spark change among their peers and leaders alike on issues including gun control, education, and LGBTQ rights.

Activists have come from diverse backgrounds that include Hollywood, the aftermath of a school shooting, and Taliban-ruled Pakistan, but see how they've all earned global reputations.

Shamma bint Suhail Faris Mazrui, 23, youth advocacy

Twitter

After an impressive academic career that includes a bachelor's degree from New York University Abu Dhabi and becoming the United Arab Emirates' first Rhodes Scholar, which earned her a master's in public policy from the University of Oxford, Mazrui was appointed as Minister of State for Youth Affairs when she was 22.

The nod earned her a spot on the 2018 Forbes Middle East Arab 30 under 30 list, but she describes her role as a much larger effort to empower young people in the UAE to be active in their society and government.

"In the UAE, Arab youth are similar to youth around the world," Mazrui told the Los Angeles Times of how she seeks to boost fellow young people's abilities. "They all want to go to the best universities. They all want to have stable careers. They want lives of purpose and they want to feel part of a cohesive community and family."

Malala Yousafzai, 22, women's and girl's education

Yousafzai was an activist long before she became the youngest Nobel Prize laureate in history in 2014, but she's since become a household name.

Growing up in Pakistan under Taliban occupation, Yousafzai's family ran a chain of schools, which inspired her impassioned and public defense of women's education, that included the then-11-year-old writing a blog post under a pen name for the BBC and starring in a New York Times documentary about life in the middle of military occupation.

However, her outspoken spirit earned her enemies in the Taliban and in October 2012, Yousafzai was shot on a school bus. She not only survived the attack, but also became the center of an international movement to support her that led Taliban officials to announce a possible second assassination attempt.

She later published her first book, " I Am Malala." Yousafzai and her family have since moved to the United Kingdom, where she is currently studying at Oxford.

Parkland shooting survivors, various ages, gun control

David Hogg, Jaclyn Corin, Emma González, Cameron Kasky, and Alex Wind were at the center of a massive youth movement for gun control after surviving a massacre that killed 17 of their classmates at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

The five teenagers sparked the #NeverAgain movement, which saw thousands of students walk out of school in a massive nationwide youth protest that swelled behind causes like stricter gun regulation and a general increase in youth participation in politics and policy.

The students have gone on to continue their work as vocal advocates for advancing gun policies and youth participation through online campaigns, media appearances, and speaking tours.

Yara Shahidi, 19, women's and girl's engagement

Shahidi first entered the spotlight as a young actress but came into her own right as an activist after taking on issues like diversity in Hollywood and female empowerment in education.

She formed Yara's Club in partnership with The Young Women's Leadership School, which sets up digital hangouts for high school students together to discuss and confront social issues.

Shahidi also worked on former first lady Michelle Obama's Let Girls Learn education initiative before Obama provided her with a letter of recommendation that contributed to her road to undergraduate studies at Harvard University.

Isra Hirsi, 16, climate change awareness

Hirsi is the eldest daughter of prominent Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar, but she's earned a reputation in her own right as a climate change activist.

After learning about the sharp racially divided effects of climate change, then-15-year-old Hirsi sprung into action to get climate change on the official agendas of local and national lawmakers.

In January 2019, Hirsi founded the US Youth Climate Strike group, an American chapter of a global climate activist movement. In her role as executive director, Hirsi has been a key part of activating a chapter to join the estimated 1.6 million students across 120 countries to skip school in March to demand official action on climate change and spoke at the Minneapolis march as part of the global climate strike on September 20.

Marley Diaz, 14, diverse representation

Dias is the founder of the #1000blackgirlbooks campaign, which she started when she was 11 in 2015 to collect and donate 1,000 books to her peers that featured black girls as the main characters when she was "sick of reading about white boys and dogs," she told her mom.

The campaign was a massive success, and she's since been honored on the Forbes30 Under 30 list. In January 2018, she published a book to inspire other potential activists titled " Marley Dias Gets It Done: And So Can You!"

She told the Chicago Tribune in 2018 that even as a published author, her initial mission remains intact as she wants to create and share stories to "be reflected for the black girls who are reading them, so they can identify themselves and learn about their history" as well as "open up to people who are different, to understand and to see and grow from those things we don't understand."

Mari Copeny, 11, water access

Copeny, who is also known as "Little Miss Flint," shot to fame when she was eight years old in March 2016 when she wrote a letter to President Barack Obama about the water crisis in Flint, Michigan. After reading her letter, Obama flew to Flint and shined a national spotlight on the crisis.

After her big presidential moment, Copeny has continued her work, including in ads for the Peoples Climate March and starting the hashtag #WednesdaysForWater, in which she sends out a weekly alert about places in need of clean water. Copeny's partnership with a water-filtration company also facilitates drinkable water in deprived communities.

Read the original article on INSIDER. Copyright 2019. Follow INSIDER onTwitter.

Climate Change

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These 10 young activists are trying to move the needle on climate change, gun control, and other global issues

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Young activists have been bucking the norms for years to spark change on behalf of gun control, education, and LGBTQ issues.

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Get access to files anywhere through secure cloud storage and file backup for your photos, videos, files and more with Google Drive.

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Iqbal Masih became a debt slave in a carpet factory in Pakistan when he was a child. Five years later he was set free. He gave other children the courage to leave their owners.

Iqbal was threatened by the carpet factory owners and was murdered on 16 April 1995. He is a symbol for the struggle against child labour and in 2000, he received the first World's Children's Prize for the Rights of the Child posthumously (after his death).

Iqbal was around five when he started working in the carpet factory. He worked from early morning until evening and was often treated badly. When his mother Anayat needs money for an operation, she took out a loan from a carpet factory owner. The loan, or 'peshgi', was in Iqbal's name. That means that Iqbal owes Ghullah the 5000 rupees (ca 600 US dollars) that his mother's operation cost. Now Iqbal was a debt slave and the factory owner was in charge of his life. > Read the whole story about Iqbal's life and death here.

Experience Iqbal's life, liberation and death in this graphic novel. © WCPF

Learn more about Iqbal in the Globe Magazine (2009).

Text: Magnus Bergmar

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Iqbal was freed after years of slave labor in a Pakistan rug factory but was then murdered at 12 for fighting child labor. Watch video and read his story.

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Rachel Atcheson is the Humane League's Philadelphia director. I wanted to interview her to shine a light on her incredible work as an animal rights activist and, hopefully, encourage and inspire teens to take action on behalf of animals.

Why did you decide to become an animal rights advocate?

I decided to help animals because they are the most underrepresented group of beings in today's society. Some might think that animals get sufficient attention, but cats and dogs receive the bulk of it. When we hear of a hoarder with 100 cats and none of them sufficiently nourished, we empathize with those cats. But farm animals are suffering every day in factory farms and we rarely hear their stories. I decided to help farm animals because they need a louder voice.

How did you think you would be able to make a difference?

I didn't start out thinking I could make much of a difference. I began volunteering with a local animal protection group (the group I work for now, the Humane League), but I had no idea the ripple effect my activism would have in the world. With the help of many mentors, I've been able to hone my activism skills and influence many people to be more involved in activism.

Has your life changed since you started helping animals?

My life has changed dramatically. I have become more compassionate and more empathetic toward the plight of both human and non-human animals. I have taken on the role of an activist - and I think this is the most important change in my life, because now I understand that no matter how much a person wants to change the world, it's the hard work, the elbow grease, that really creates meaningful change.

What is the main problem animals face right now?

These issues of confinement and mutilation are common for farm animals everywhere. All factory farms treat animals as if they were commodities, property, and this is, I believe, the biggest problem facing farmed animals right now.

I'd love to tell you the story of one animal in particular. Buttercup is an egg-laying hen who has lived her entire life in a cage smaller than a piece of paper. She has never met her mother. Because of her close confinement with other chickens, Buttercup's beak was seared off with a hot blade soon after she was born so she wouldn't peck any other chickens in her cage. Ever since she was young, Buttercup has lived in this battery cage. She has never been outside, never felt the sun on her feathers or the grass beneath her feet. And she'll remain there for her whole life. Her feet might become mangled in the wire mesh she stands on. If she develops an infection, she will not receive veterinary attention.

On a typical egg-laying farm, there could be 500,000 chickens, so Buttercup is just one of many chickens who will never see the outside of that warehouse.

What does it take to become an effective activist?

Be positive, set a good example, read literature on effective activism and, most of all, practice. If you want to learn more about animal activism, consider getting involved with groups such as the Humane League, Mercy for Animals, or Compassion Over Killing. All of these groups are very effective in their work.

How can we make a difference in the lives of animals?

The number-one way you can make a difference in the lives of animals is to cut back on the amount of animals you eat; consider trying Meatless Monday. And if you already do not consume much meat, consider going vegetarian. Are you already a vegetarian? Cut back on the amount of eggs and dairy you consume. And finally, try veganism.

While it may seem daunting to do anything in this list, if you take it one step at a time, one meal at a time, you'll find it easy, exciting, and fulfilling. We have an opportunity to make a difference in the lives of animals three times a day - breakfast, lunch, and dinner - and with your help, we will see changes for farm animals.

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Rachel Atcheson is the Humane League's Philadelphia director. I wanted to interview her to shine a light on her incredible work as an animal rights activist and, hopefully, encourage and inspire teens to take action on behalf of animals. Why did you decide to become an animal rights advocate?

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Nine stories made by and about young people making a difference

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Teen producers find and tell stories of young people making a difference in their communities for this special PBS NewsHour Student Reporting Labs feature.

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"Do you think this is the right color ribbon?" asked a petite brunette, her hair pulled back in a haphazard ponytail, her college sweatshirt engulfing her tiny frame. "And do you think these are the right length of sections I'm cutting? I don't want it to be all funky when we pin them on."

"Mmm ... I'm not sure," said the guy next to her, sucking on a lollipop, his football-player physique totally evident in his tight band T-shirt.

"Looks good to me," his roommate said without even glancing over at the ribbon or the girl.

Meet the college anti-war movement.

I just got back from a two-week campus speaking tour during which I had the privilege of hanging out in a women's center at a Catholic college, eating bad Mexican food with Mennonite feminists, and chatting with aspiring writers and activists at a college in which half the students are the first in their families to experience higher education. I heard the stories of transgender youth in Kansas City, jocks with food addictions in Jacksonville, and student organizers who are too overwhelmed to address all the world's problems in Connecticut.

When my plane finally landed with a resounding bump at LaGuardia, I felt totally inspired by the earnest enthusiasm that beamed out of almost every student I encountered -- and also terrified that the university system is sucking the life out of them. At the risk of biting the hand that feeds me (I am usually paid to speak, in part, by student organizations and women's centers), I have to attest that the institutionalization of activism on college campuses seems to be a key culprit in the absence of visible youth movements in this country.

The scene above illustrates just the kind of vibe you can find at an anti-war or nonviolence club on college campuses any day of the week. It is sweetly collaborative, mainly focused on raising awareness among students, very keyed in to particular dates (Love Your Body Day, Earth Day, Black History Month), and most of all, safe. This is not terribly surprising considering that these clubs are sanctioned and funded (sometimes with upward of thousands of dollars a year) by the school administration through a formal application process. They are structured to legitimize but also to domesticate student passions and actions from the start.

And students do have passions, contrary to what some hippies-turned-well-paid-pundits argue. A survey conducted just this year by the National Association of Campus Activities (NACA) found that 98 percent of students at their annual meeting saw the war in Iraq as one of the issues most important to them. Erin Wilson, the director of communication for NACA, reports that student involvement in campus activities is increasing all the time and adds that among their 1,040 member schools, a yearly total of $150 million is spent on campus programming.

As great as it might seem that colleges and universities are supporting student causes, I actually believe that it has tamed the critical energy necessary to be young, outraged, and active. When you're being funded by a team of white-haired academics in suits, taking real risks -- acts of civil disobedience like sit-ins, hunger strikes, boycotts -- don't seem like such a smart idea. Students rightly wonder whether they will "ruin it" for the next class if they cross the line and lose the school leadership's support. Plus, it's so much easier to just eat the free pizza and cut the three-inch ribbons than to mastermind a rebellious and potentially dangerous student uprising.

The academy, in general, encourages specialization, intellectualization, civility -- not exactly the key ingredients for effective social action. Students are surrounded by professors reminiscing about the glory days of youth activism, when groups like Students for a Democratic Society, the Weather Underground, and the Black Panther Party really ignited social change. But the professors don't seem to make the connection that none of these were school-sanctioned organizations.

Today's youth activism is largely enacted within the gated fortresses of higher learning. Students are overwhelmingly and often motivated by applying to law school or resumé-building. (How do you think they got into these undergraduate institutions in the first place?) They funnel their outrage into weekly club meetings and awareness campaigns that look good on paper -- activities that convey to future employers and institutions that they are socially involved and aware but not at odds with the system. Students seem to join sanctioned, existing clubs, rather than launch their own radical actions, without much resistance or critical questioning. Perhaps they've been socialized to accept the status quo, but even more, I believe they simply don't have the time or energy to start innovative revolutions from scratch because they are so busy taking standardized tests and building their resumés with internships and assistantships.

I watched a group of them sort through a brightly colored stack of anti-war quotations to make sure that every single one, literally, bore the stamp of approval from the college activities office so they could hang them around campus without getting in trouble. It made me cringe. This is where their energies were being diverted during the deadliest month yet in the Iraq War.

It made me reflect on my own undergraduate days -- just about five years ago now. I wasn't a rah-rah student government officer, but I certainly did my share of club activities: school newspaper, writing fellows program, resident assistant, volunteering at a Harlem preschool, even the hip-hop club (talk about taming outrage). I remember feeling so busy, so responsible, so important. Now I realize that there was a real cost to that frenzy of school-sanctioned productivity. I rarely thought beyond the borders of folding tables that lined the student activities fairs. I rarely put my body or my future on the line. While I was tutoring fellow students in grammar and composition and making door tags for my residence halls, I missed the escalation of a bogus justification for a messy war in my name.

In one of the largest studies ever conducted of Generation Y, psychology professor Jean M. Twenge found that college students "increasingly believe that their lives are controlled by outside forces" -- called "externality" in the psychology field. Twenge writes, "The average college student in 2002 had more external control beliefs than 80 percent of college students in the early 1960s."

Is it any wonder? We were raised to organize our adolescent lives in pursuit of external approval: church awards, athletic scholarships, and college admissions. More than any generation in history, we've been signed up, roped in, and overscheduled. When we get to college, many of us rush to join clubs in an attempt to recreate this safe feeling of sanctioned activity, of organized energies, of potential approval by authorities. Our innate passions and spontaneous actions have essentially been bred out of us.

The LearningWork Connection, a consulting firm on youth issues, reports that from September 2004 to September 2005, 79 percent of first-year males and 87 percent of first-year females described themselves as "volunteers." They add, however, that "Gen Y is less engaged with civic and political activities than they are with other causes."

Which prompts me to ask, what are "causes," really? The word stinks of bureaucracy and timidity, of the most educated, wanted generation in history sprawled across standard university furniture -- not planning the next revolution, but eating free cookies and voting on whether buttons or ribbons will be less destructive to students' clothing.

I saw the surefire glimmer of pure passion in these students' eyes. I know they are capable of great and ingenious uprisings, a type of protest that is totally 21st century, a trademark Generation Y invention. Viruses in campus administrators' computers with pop-up windows demanding no more expansion into poor, local neighborhoods? Mock draft cards sent home to their parents? A dance party -- 1 million youth strong -- on the Washington lawn? It all seems possible.

They need to stay out of the student center long enough to figure out what their version of outraged activism really is. Small as it may sound, big change would happen if college students today could protect their purest intentions from the pacifying force of free pizza and resumé kudos. Our generation needs to step into our raw power -- the priceless power of being young and mad. We need to stay hungry long enough to get angry.

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The institutionalization of activism on college campuses is a key culprit in the absence of visible youth movements in this country.

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Having trouble with your rebellious teen? Get them involved in community volunteer work. A new study from the University of Missouri found that this type of prosocial activity makes youth less likely to turn to drugs and alcohol.

Young adults between the ages of 18 and 25 report the highest rates of substance use and dependence, the U.S. National Survey on Drug Use and Health says. Gustavo Carlo, a professor in the University of Missouri's Human Development and Family Studies Department, found that prosocial behaviors, such as volunteering and donating to charity, serve as protective factors against adolescents engaging in risky behaviors as young adults. His study was published in the Journal of Youth and Adolescence.

Good deeds pay it forward

Carlo examined data from surveys of 531 youths in rural Pennsylvania counties. The group was surveyed over a seven-year period as participants moved through junior high school to young adulthood.

"Prosocial behaviors are good for society and communities, but also they are a marker of moral development," the professor says. "Parents want their kids to be kind, selfless, considerate and respectful. We now have evidence that these prosocial behaviors make adolescents less likely to break moral codes and engage in illegal activities."

Youth in rural communities are more at risk

The study focused on rural youths because research shows they may be more likely to use illicit substances earlier. Positive, prosocial activities are less available. Rural communities tend to be more spread out, making it difficult for teens to get transportation to events and activities. These communities often have less access to recreation centers, spaces for meetings, volunteers to run programs and funding for organized activities.

Community groups and schools need to organize activities

"We need to organize prosocial activities in schools and communities," Carlo says. "If we start early in childhood, kids can practice and learn to reap the rewards of prosocialness so that it becomes normative and habitual. These opportunities are not costly and kids are very creative and can contribute to the development of these activities. In the long run, kids can become invested in their communities and become engaged community citizens."

Teens can volunteer to do community clean-up work, yard work and chores for seniors, mentor younger kids in reading or math, or help coach community sports teams.

Substance abuse prevention is less costly than treatment

The research has important implications for substance use prevention and intervention programs aimed at teens, Carlo says. "The emphasis on prevention is far less costly and likely more effective than treatment after the problem presents itself. It involves transforming the culture of our schools so that we emphasize both academics and psychological and behavioral well-being."

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Volunteering reduces teens' risk of addiction

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Having trouble with your rebellious teen? Get them involved in community volunteer work. A new study from the University of Missouri found that this type of prosocial activity makes youth less likely to turn to drugs and alcohol. Young adults between the ages of 18 and 25 report the highest rates of substance use and dependence, the U.S.

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Newsela | Instructional Content Platform

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Newsela is an Instructional Content Platform that supercharges reading engagement and learning in every subject.

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Air Date: Week of January 4, 2008

stream/download this segment as an MP3 file
Alex Lin (Courtesy of Alex Lin)
Living on Earth interviews Alex Lin, who won the Brower Youth Award for his pioneering work on electronic waste. Lin recycled and refurbishes computers for kids in the U.S. and around the world.

Transcript

CURWOOD: One kid who needs no New Year's resolutions on the environment is 14-year-old Alex Lin. When he was 11 he came across a newspaper article about the massive piles of E-waste-that's waste from electronics and computers that's generated around the world.

When the electronic devices we use every day get taken apart or dumped, toxic substances, like lead, leech into the environment. Alex decided to attack E-waste, starting at home. He founded WIN - Westerly Innovations Network (named after his town of Westerly, Rhode Island).

And this year he received the prestigious Brower Youth Award for young environmental leaders. Alex Lin, welcome to Living on Earth.

LIN: Thanks a lot.

CURWOOD: So one day you're reading the newspaper. You see this article about E-waste and you decide to do something about it. What was it that grabbed you? What made you decide to make this your mission?

LIN: I think what helped me choose to do this was that it's such a little known problem, really. When we started our project in our town, like, when we found out how many people knew about it, it was just less than 15 percent. It was like, ten percent or so of residents even knew what E-waste was, so I mean, just the fact that it's so little known and that by raising awareness we could just do so much to help it. That kind of grabbed our attention when we started the project.

CURWOOD: So how many computers are you guys recycling?

LIN: Recycling-wise we're not really sure about the amount. We just kind of hear back from CR2 Recycling because they weigh the trucks and they let us know how much we've been recycling every month or so. Because whenever a container fills up, the people at the transportation station they call them and they'll send down a truck to bring it to the facility in Massachusetts.

CURWOOD: So it's what-5,000 pounds a month or something like that?

LIN: Something like that. I mean it varies between month and month. I mean, some months it's like 25 hundred, some months it's a lot more. It all depends.

CURWOOD: Now you're working internationally. You've taken the whole thing that you started in Westerly, Rhode Island and you've taken it to people around the world. How's that working?

LIN: Yeah, it's working really well right now. Right now one of our contacts and friends in Cameroon-Rosemary-and she's been helping us to establish WIN teams in Africa and she's been looking around in Kenya, Tanzania, Cameroon. Right now we have two definite set-up WIN teams in Kenya and Cameroon and the rest are on the way. And she's also helped us a lot by looking for schools that need computers so that computers in the U.S. used by companies in large numbers can be reused and sent to people across the world who really need these computers to help better their lives. And we have a Mexican WIN team who's raising awareness. And right now I think Rosemary's been talking with a team in the UK about starting a group there and we're just kind of dealing with it as it comes because it's been coming pretty fast for the past couple of months. But we're going to have to do the work and we're ready to do it, I guess.

CURWOOD: Hey, Alex. Can you tell me a story of where you know one of your computers helped change somebody's life?

LIN: Yeah, I definitely have a pretty good one that we did. You know, after the tsunami in 2004 there was a lot of shortages of computers, learning equipment, schools, teachers. We actually had a local pediatrician from our area-she went to Malaysia and Sri Lanka I think at the time to help out and she met an English teacher there and he contacted us saying there's a need for computers over there and we ended up sending five computers and a laptop. And it was really cool because he sent us some pictures afterward of the children singing to like Barney software and other educational stuff that we put on there and afterwards they named the school the WIN learning center after our team and that was just like really cool that we could have such an impact on the other side of the world.

CURWOOD: By the way, how do you find the time to do all this work on top of what-homework, sports, piano, and well, let's face it, being a kid?

LIN: Yeah. I don't know. It kind of just depends. Like it's more of a-I remember one of my friends I met at Brower in Boston-Carlos. He said it's more of a lifestyle and I totally agree with him. Environmental justice community work is like a lifestyle. You kind of incorporate time to do it into every day and if not every day, definitely on a regular basis because I mean, sure there are times where I would have projects, reports, tests the next day. Or, even sports games and stuff that I need to get with, but usually I'm able to find time during the week to do the work.

CURWOOD: Alex Lin's organization is called WIN, Westerly Innovations Network. Alex received the prestigious Brower Youth Award for young environmental leaders. Congratulations Alex, and thank you so much for taking this time.

LIN: Thanks a lot, Steve.

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Alex Lin (Courtesy of Alex Lin) Living on Earth interviews Alex Lin, who won the Brower Youth Award for his pioneering work on electronic waste. Lin recycled and refurbishes computers for kids in the U.S. and around the world. CURWOOD: One kid who needs no New Year's resolutions on the environment is 14-year-old Alex Lin.

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Though Olivia Bryant, the CEO of YCore, had observed the gender gap at other nonprofits, she was still surprised at the discrepancy. She knew women often dominated volunteer spaces, but 95%? The YCore team set to work to recruit men, and they have since increased the proportion of applications from men to about 25%.

So are women just the more altruistic sex? Or is this a reflection of other social realities, like fewer women choosing to be in the labour force, or working part-time? Our data analysis reveals that no matter how you cut it, women do seem to have a higher proclivity for volunteering. We explore why this might be.

25.3% of Americans choose to volunteer at least once a year, and nearly half of the individuals that volunteer do so an average of more than one hour per week. These numbers come from a September 2014 of Americans ages 15 and older conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics . Volunteering is defined as any unpaid work performed for an organization. It can include anything tutoring English at the local library, coaching your child's basketball team, or helping your church with a fundraiser.

Not all Americans are equally likely to volunteer. The probability that a given person will volunteer is impacted by their age, income, education level and, not least of all, by gender. In 2014, 28.4% of women volunteered at least once, while only 22.2% of men did so.

The following chart displays the percentage of Americans that volunteer at any given age. We can see from this chart that the likelihood of volunteering changes a great deal over our lives, but that women are always more inclined than men.

The likelihood of volunteering rises again in the late 30s and reaches its zenith in the early 40s. Over 30% of Americans between the ages of 40 and 45 volunteer. This is related to the increased likelihood of volunteering when having children. While having a baby actually makes you less likely to volunteer - only 17% of people whose first child is 2-years-old or less volunteer - when their child reaches school age, people become dramatically more likely to volunteer. Over 35% of parents with children between 6-13 volunteer, often for a school activity.

Though women volunteer more than men at all ages, the effect of having children does seem to be greater for women. We can see in the chart above that the gender difference is largest between 35 and 45, when 10% more women volunteer than men.

Parents frequently volunteer for their kids' school.

Yet even when we only compare men and women who work full-time, we still find a large gender gap in terms of who volunteers. 30.1% of women who work full-time also find the time to volunteer in comparison to just 23.8% of men.

Given the importance of income on the likelihood to volunteer, we wondered whether the gender gap might disappear at different levels of family earnings. These next three charts display the percentage of adult men and women working full-time who volunteer by family income and age.

We wondered if looking at what women and men actually do when they volunteer might give us some insight into the gender imbalance. The table below shows the proportion of men and women, of those who volunteer, who volunteer for different types of groups. Only the primary volunteer organization of the individual is included, so each individual is only counted once. For example, the main volunteer organization for 35.1% of women is a religious one, while this is only true of 33.2% of men.

Overall, looking at the groups that women volunteer for does not give us much of a clue to the discrepancy, but it does point to the gendered nature of certain types of volunteering.

So what accounts for the volunteer gap between the sexes?

Jesse Eubanks of the non-profit Love Thy Neighborhood blames the "suspended adolescence" of young American men today. He sees a large number of young men unwilling to embrace responsibility. "Man-boys" who are not ready to take on the risks and relationships of being in a community. The guys in probably were not doing much volunteer work.

Energize Inc. , a consultancy for nonprofits, published an entire dedicated to helping volunteer organizations recruit men. They suggest that one problem is that much of the recruiting material from organizations is oriented towards women. Men may feel like the organization is a female space when they only see female faces in brochures and other materials. Another challenge is that many organizations already have a preponderance of women, and any new men will feel that they don't belong. Being the first guy can be be uncomfortable.

When asked it was important to have men volunteer, Bryant responded that it was the same reason she wanted people of different races and economic backgrounds participating in her organization. "We want our group of volunteers as diverse as possible," Bryant explained. "Men can bring a different perspective."

By any way you slice it, when it comes to demonstrating altruism through volunteering, women are simply dominating men. Regardless of whether they work or not, how old they are, or how rich they are, women just volunteer more.

For our next post, we tell the story of Esurance's old mascot, who was discontinued after being made into cartoon porn. To get notified when we post it →

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Why Don't Men Volunteer as Much as Women? - Priceonomics

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We analyze the female dominance of volunteerism in America.

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Ruhy Patel, 17, lives in Doylestown, Pa. When she was 15 she was planning to run for student council office. "All the other people running were boys," she says, "and people were like, 'Well, you're not going to win.' You feel intimidated because you're the only girl in the room. It makes you question if you'd be OK in the field of politics."

Did she drop out? No.

Did she win? "I did!"

"I feel like it kind of makes you want to try harder when people say no," says Patel.

That could be the motto for the activists of Girl Up. There are nearly 5,000 teenage girls in 66 countries who volunteer for the U.N. Foundation group. They speak out and raise money so every girl can go to school - there are an estimated 62 million who don't - and can receive official government identification papers, can get proper health care and gain the skills to pursue her dreams.

This week, we met with 13 "teen advisers" from Girl Up. They were a few of the 225 members in Washington, D.C., for the annual leadership summit.

Unlike the 62 million out-of-school girls, these Girl Up girls are all in school. They're thinking about college; they lead comfortable lives. Sometimes their friends can't understand their activism. "They don't think we're able to make a difference," says Janet Ho, 18, who lives in Los Angeles. But that's not true, she says.

Kennede Reese, 18, from Denver, mentions a SchoolCycle fundraiser. The proceeds were used to send bikes to girls in Malawi: "Because even though they have the school supplies, there's no way to get to school to get the education they need. We think of the small things."

The girls we spoke with all live in the U.S., but some have roots in the countries they're trying to help. So they know firsthand what life can be like outside the American bubble.

"My family is from the most rural part of China," says Amy Gong Liu, 18, of Alameda, Calif. "My dad was chosen to go to school instead of my aunt. My aunt was very brilliant, very outspoken about women's issues." But she never learned to read and write.

"When [my dad] told her he was going to have a daughter - me - she said, 'Make sure you educate her, keep her in the loop at the dinner table, make sure she has a voice.' "

Liu pauses: "It's hard not to think, 'What if I was born in China and my aunt was born in America, and she had the opportunity [for] success and I didn't?' "

Does the unfairness of it all make the teen leaders feel guilty?

The unanimous reply: Yes, yes, yes!

Yet they've learned that even though girls in low-income countries face many obstacles, they have a sense of hope and gratitude.

Ishana Nigam, 17, from Charlotte, N.C., visits India every year or so. That's where her parents are from. The girls she meets have "a lack of education, poor health care," she says. "But they're not jealous of me. They always tell me, 'I'm thankful for what I have, thankful just to be breathing.' And that takes a toll on me because I have so many more things than they have."

Meanwhile, all the girls bond over pop culture.

"I tutor refugees in Chicago," says Celia Buckman, 16. "They're 10 to 12, from all over, Malaysia, Kenya, India, Iraq. And they like to listen to ' Shake It Off' by Taylor Swift. They come from all over the world, they practice different religions, speak different languages, but they can all sit down and watch Taylor Swift videos, and that's great!"

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Haters Gonna Hate. Teen Girl Activists Shake It Off And Try Again

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These Girl Up leaders know that it's hard being a girl anywhere in the world - whether you're fighting to go to school or convincing boys that yes, girls can run for student council, too!

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Young leaders start here

Girl Up guides and champions girls along their journey from leader to changemaker with specialized programming on global gender issues and in organizing, advocacy, fundraising, and communication.

Get Started

I never thought that I would get an opportunity like this: to be surrounded by so many amazing girls who are just as passionate about social justice issues as I am.
Fatimata Cham, 2018-2019 Teen Advisor

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Girl Up | Uniting Girls to Change the World

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Young leaders start here Girl Up guides and champions girls along their journey from leader to changemaker with specialized programming on global gender issues and in organizing, advocacy, fundraising, and communication. Get Started I never thought that I would get an opportunity like this: to be surrounded by so many amazing girls who are just as passionate about social justice issues as I am.

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Newsela | Instructional Content Platform

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Newsela is an Instructional Content Platform that supercharges reading engagement and learning in every subject.

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Newsela | Nobel laureate Malala, Afghan novelist show how to wield power with words

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How Canadian youth are making green mainstream and creating some serious hope for the future.

It might be shocking news to some. Teenagers-those headphone-touting brooders so often viewed as lazy, irresponsible and disinterested in world issues-care about the environment. They really care, suggest the results of an Australian survey released earlier this week. More than 80 percent of 4000 teens surveyed are concerned for the environment, citing worries such as bushfires, climate change and animal extinctions at the top of the list. And two thirds of them believe that their government is too inactive on the green front.

A hop, skip and a hemisphere away, these sustainability sentiments are being echoed by Canada's own generation of green-inclined teens. Canadian youth are concerned about the environment, and some are taking extraordinary steps to help out. Enter Simon Jackson, a B.C. youth who started a campaign to save the rare Spirit Bear at the age of 13. He founded Spirit Bear Youth (one of the world's largest youth environmental organizations), has been featured in a CTV documentary and has even signed onto a Hollywood animated film deal. Or Alysia Garmulewicz, from B.C., who organized and directed the Canadian Youth Climate Change Conference ( YC3) at 17 years old.

Here's another: Colin Carter, a grade 10 Toronto student who recently released a documentary on climate change after being inspired by a class assignment. He called it Fight for the Planet, and he poignantly asks, "If we don't ... who will?"

Teen activism

This urgent sense of responsibility-to fight for their planet since no one else is (or, at least, not well enough)-stems from disillusionment with governments and older generations, whose inaction in the face of major environmental crises will surely affect teens' futures.

As Greg Ross of the Sierra Youth Coalition explains, "Teens are realizing that they will be the ones having to deal with all the environmental problems left behind from the older generation, and they are not going to wait around and do nothing. Our government's stewardship has been very weak and young people cannot trust or believe that the government will solve all the problems. Canada used to be viewed as an environmental leader and now...we are heading in the wrong direction and young people do not want this to happen."

It's therefore time to put away the stereotypes of teens as apathetic and apolitical, says Jenn Savedge, author of the forthcoming The Green Teen: The Eco-Friendly Teen's Guide to Saving the Planet (New Society Publishers, 2009). And she cites Barack Obama's presidential campaign as proof that "teenagers really can mobilize, their voices can be heard and they can really bring about change if they're united around a cause they really care about."

Teens today are uniting around the green cause, espousing Gandhi's powerful message that "You must be the change you wish to see in the world." This change is loud and strong across the country. From large environmental youth groups, to eco-clubs in high schools, to individual initiatives, Canadian teenagers are making green mainstream. (See the resources section below for just some of the many examples.)

Tools of technology

The success of these green teen initiatives is due in large part to social media and networking. Facebook, MySpace, blogging and Twitter provide teen-led grassroots campaigns with a huge advantage, says Savedge. (Yes, those activities that keep teens holed up in their room for hours might actually be working towards the greater good).

As Jesse Jenkins of The Huffington Post writes, referring to the youth-driven Power Shift 2009 campaign for action against climate change: "The unprecedented, networked nature of this movement allows young activists across the country to connect with their peers...and grow in size and power faster than past movements." Social networking allows youth activists from every corner of a country-no matter how far-to unite online, strengthen their offline organization and grow their green movements, he continues. And there are hundreds of eco-themed youth-driven Facebook groups to prove it.

Green today, greener tomorrow

Once infused with the green spark, and helped along by social media, there is no stopping teens' success. But that doesn't mean there aren't challenges along the way. One of the biggest barriers, according to all of Savedge's young interviewees, is their youth! Teens with great green ideas are not always taken seriously at first because of their age. "It can be difficult to get the grants from sponsors, the support from politicians or the participation of communities," says Savedge. Ross also agrees that "a lot of teenagers these days do not feel that adults take them seriously". And yet they persevere-establishing prominent organizations like Teens Turning Green or the many Canadian for-youth-by-youth groups and campaigns.

On the eve of the 39th anniversary of Earth Day, today's teens seem to be living up to the words of Julia Butterfly Hill, a youth environmental activist famous for her 1997 tree live-in. She once said: "We are constantly told that we are the leaders of tomorrow... That's a lie. We are the leaders of today."

For more information on the resources available to youth who want to get involved in the environmental movement, visit these websites:

Organizations

Sierra Youth Coalition - Sustainable High Schools: teens transform their schools to green

Environmental Youth Alliance: west-coast programs and workshops for green teens

Canadian Youth Climate Coalition: making climate change issues a nationwide priority

Environnement Jeunesse: a Quebec-based group of eco-youth with many green projects

Programs

Otesha: youth (as young as age 13) cycle across the country to promote positive change

Katimavik Eco-Citizenship program: a 6-month all-expenses-paid environmental action and leadership program for youth (17 and up)

Students on Ice: opportunity for Canadian youth to travel to Antarctica (14-19 years old)

Blogs, websites and networks
Inconvenient Youth Obviously.ca
Planet Connect
It's Getting Hot in Here Roots and Shoots

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Teens unite for the planet - Green Living Show

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How Canadian youth are making green mainstream and creating some serious hope for the future. It might be shocking news to some. Teenagers-those headphone-touting brooders so often viewed as lazy, irresponsible and disinterested in world issues-care about the environment. They really care, suggest the results of an Australian survey released earlier this week.

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As we reflect on the ways Americans of all ages across the country helped each other in the aftermath of 9/11, it seemed fitting for us to ask high-school students in North Hollywood, California, where Ernestine Fu went to school, to tell us about an experience in which they helped others in their community. We received almost 100 thoughtful responses. Read together, they make clear that these teenagers are committed to community service and are gaining a deep sense of satisfaction in that service.

Here are ten ways youth are making a difference today.
1) Sana Ahmed
Sana Ahmed described a cigarette pick-up at North Hollywood Park. The event was organized by her school's American Cancer Society (ACS), which works to alert people to the dangers of smoking. The cigarette butts were saved in a large container and used as a symbol in teaching others about the hazards of smoking among other cancer causing activities.

"Just on our short walk to the park, we were able to collect about three hundred butts, which were located around the sidewalk. By a nearby freeway entrance, we were able to find a shocking amount of cigarette butts... After about two hours, we had collected about 2,300 butts in all. Everyone, including the people in the park, had big smiles on their faces because of the pride of what we had just accomplished."
2) Woojin Cheon
Woojin Cheon volunteers with The Salvation Army and its child-care center. He helps elementary and middle school students from low-income families with their schoolwork. Tutoring at the center has also inspired Woojin to help raise money for students in financial need so they can buy needed supplies and books.

"Teaching, for me, has been a way for me to give back to a community... When I was able to help an elementary student understand a mathematical concept, the student developed a deeper interested in the subject, which was greatly rewarding... I was happy simply because I was able to help someone."
3) Isabella Fortier
Isabella Fortier volunteered for Wendy Greuel 's campaign to be the mayor of Los Angeles in 2013. Although Isabella was not yet old enough to vote, she spent her time making calls and encouraging those in her community to vote for Greuel. Greuel would have been Los Angeles' first female mayor, but she lost to Eric Garcetti.

"For nine months, I dedicated every spare hour of my time to phone banking, canvassing, and campaigning for mayoral candidate Wendy Greuel. While this took hours of office work as well as hours of walking in the hot sun, the experience was one of the most rewarding of my life."
4) Sean Garcia
Sean Garcia belongs to an organization called IXIM, a center for the integration of indigenous Mayas. IXIM was started to create a community of Maya refugees. Mayan customs were repressed in Guatemala during the Spanish Conquest. Many Guatemalans fled to Los Angeles, including Sean's family. Each year, IXIM holds a toy drive for children with the help of the local fire department.

"Whenever I come back from these events, I gain two things, a joy from having seen all the kids happy with their toys and a greater respect for the things that I have... Volunteering is a mutually beneficial and kind thing to do. If you have the time to do something for others, and you really like what you are doing then it is worth the time and effort you put into making these events happen."
5) Rahul Goyal
Rahul Goyal volunteers at a nonprofit organization called Caring Hand for Children. The organization provides education to those living in underprivileged areas in India. One project is an annual cultural show that is held to raise money for this work. Rahul's part of the show is a dance whose theme pertains to a particular period of Indian history. Last year, the event raised $150,000 to help over 1,600 children.

"As a volunteer who played a role in making this possible, I was actually both joyful and extremely surprised at these numbers. Never had I been part of anything so small that could raise that type of money just within a day and a couple hours of preparation."
6) Katie Lam
Katie Lam volunteers at Teenline, a teen-to-teen crisis hotline. The hotline is affiliated with the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center 's Department of Psychiatry. Nearly 9,000 youth call the hotline every year. Volunteers like Katie are trained to listen, not judge, those who call and assess options with them.

"Every time the phone rings, it is a different experience. It's not always a different caller, but always, an individual whose struggles stem from the same root as the caller before. Sometimes the call has to do with child abuse. Sometimes it's self-harm. We use a reference system to keep track of our calls, checking off boxes with subjects most relevant to the call, like "Bullying," "School," and "Relationships" after we've hung up the phone. On rare nights, I don't need to check more than one box to sum up a call. Most nights, I have to check several. There is almost always overlap."
7) Romina Noorbakhsh
Romina Noorbakhsh helps Teens for Jeans. Volunteers collect used jeans from schools throughout America, and Teens for Jeans donates them to one of 1,000 homeless shelters across the U.S. and Canada. Last year, Romina and her fellow volunteers at North Hollywood High School collected over 500 pairs of jeans within a little over a month.

"When I went in, I carried this big box of jeans to the store... I was struggling to carry it all the way, so my friend helped me. As we were walking, underneath the box broke and all the jeans fell out. Everyone in the mall was staring and to us... We put the jeans back, we took a few steps furthers, then flop, it all came out again. This time, we were laughing so hard, and we put the jeans back and took it to the store... We finally gave all the boxes and left. I had an amazing feeling... I felt happy that I did something like that, and I was so excited for those kids to get the jeans we collected."
8) Alexandra Nordyke
Alexandra Nordyke volunteers for Visual Arts and Music for Society (VAMS), an organization that brings music and art to community centers. Alexandra initially viewed art as "an individual task." But volunteering with VAMS changed this perception, and she now realizes the satisfactions of sharing her passion for painting with those less privileged than her. At one youth center, VAMS set up stations for different kinds of arts activities.

"The most popular station was the face painting station. The face painting station started to just paint butterflies and flowers, but later in the night, they expanded to paint superhero faces. The most popular face paint was Spiderman. It was a lot of fun to see kids running around in Spiderman face paint, playing superhero games. I have given back to society through art."
9) Vedang Patankar
Vedang has volunteered as a teacher's assistant, helping first, second, and third graders struggling with English at Akanksha Institute's DN Nagar Municipal School in India. The students come from families below the poverty line and often have little prior education. These students "knew little English" and "spoke in a variety of languages at home," said Vedang. He "struggled to understand them and teach them English without getting frustrated." Over time, however, Vedang developed a strong relationship with them.

"The children and staff referred to me as 'bhaiyya,' brother in Hindi, and such friendliness made the volunteering far more meaningful than simply 'collecting hours.' A month after my initial visit, the students received their first unit test scores, and the marked improvement convinced me that my efforts had paid off... Through public service in Akanksha, my vision of community service was transformed from being a requirement to a personal obligation."
10) Harriet Steele
Harriet Steele participates in her high school's Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA), which helps lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) students connect with straight students, and support one another. This includes increasing awareness of HIV/AIDS and assisting organizations such as AIDS Project Los Angeles. When Harriet started high school two years ago, she said she was only vaguely aware of AIDS Project Los Angeles and their AIDS Walk. Harriet has since participated in AIDS Walk annually. In addition to participating in walks and raising money for them, she has also donated canned and packaged food for locals living with HIV/AIDS.

"I realized that, even as one individual, I had the power to make differences in the lives of people suffering with this debilitating disease. I knew that this would not be my last time attending the AIDS Walk, nor would it be my last involvement with AIDS Project Los Angeles."
Note: Space constraints limit us to ten examples, but we could have chosen many others that are no less impressive. We initially misspelled Wendy Greuel's name as "Gruel." We regret the error.

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High School Students Making A Difference In The Lives Of Others

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As we reflect on the ways Americans of all ages across the country helped each other in the aftermath of 9/11, it seemed fitting for us to ask high-school students in North Hollywood, California, where Ernestine Fu went to school, to tell us about an experience in which they helped others in their community.

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On April 23, in France, Emmanuel Macron, an independent centrist, and Marine Le Pen, of the far-right National Front party, were chosen by voters as the top two candidates in the first round of the country's presidential election, sparking demonstrations in Paris, Rennes, and elsewhere across the country.

Students of the French equivalent of high school, called lycée, took to the streets in protest against both candidates as part of what's being called "Night of the Barricades." High schools shut down as students fought with police in the streets. It was one of the latest in a series of massive protests held over the last 15 months, largely led by high school and college students.

This resistance has risen out of a variety of struggles. Even before the recent election, French youth helped lead major protests against rallies held by the National Front in Bordeaux on April 2 and in Paris on April 16, bringing together refugees and anti-fascists to combat Le Pen's anti-immigrant, nationalistic rhetoric.

While it's difficult to speculate on the ages of the young protestors, as they often keep their faces covered, most enrolled in lycée are between 15 and 18 years old. They are violently opposed to Le Pen and her far-right National Front party. But these protests have equally targeted Macron, whom students worry will prioritize the concerns of banks and financial institutions over the desires of French students and workers, continuing the unpopular labor reforms begun by current president François Hollande.

As recently as May 1, French students took to the streets for reasons not unfamiliar to other young people in countries around the world: They're tired of wage inequality, police brutality, racism, and a political system that they believe makes big promises but leaves too many behind. In order to better understand their struggle and the yearlong protests they've led across France ahead of the final presidential vote on Sunday, we are here to help explain their positions.
The movement started in March 2016 in protest of the current government.
Since then, students have continued to be at the forefront of many major political struggles in France. They are largely unaffiliated with existing formal political organizations, but feel President Hollande's Socialist party failed in its campaign promise to help French youth, who have suffered greatly in the economic downturn after the 2008 financial crisis. The administration introduced a law, known as the "loi travail," or "labor law," which gave more power to businesses in labor negotiations, making it easier to fire employees or avoid paying them overtime. Faced with this prospect, high school students decided to take matters into their own hands and called for massive demonstrations against the proposed law.
They managed to shut down city streets - and their schools.
High schools all over Paris were shut down by their own students who blockaded school doors, choosing instead to take to the streets in opposition to the government. These massive demonstrations continued almost every day for the entire month of March last year, growing in size and determination, despite often-violent police repression. "Tout le monde déteste la police," or "Everyone hates the police," became a rallying cry for protesters against inequality, the mistreatment of refugees, racist policing, and government corruption. What started specifically in protest of the labor law expanded to include criticism of the French government as a whole.
They've been joined in solidarity by other groups across France.
At the end of March 2016, an occupation known as Nuit Debout was launched in the Place de République in Paris, where students were joined by refugees, factory workers, teachers, anarchists, and many others. At its height, the marches launched by Nuit Debout gathered several hundred thousand people from across the nation. When the labor law was passed in July, the occupation and protests continued throughout the summer and fall, including a massive student demonstration on September 15, the first day of the school year, in which informal groups of students vowed to continue their struggle. (At the same time, France's powerful unions expressed that they might give up.)
Police violence has informed French protests, too.
In February of this year, Théo, a 22-year-old black man, was raped and beaten by police in a Paris suburb. This launched yet another new wave of student protests against police racism, brutality, and the state. Students again blockaded their schools, demanding justice for Théo and all victims of police brutality. At least 16 high schools were closed as a result.
And though they're denouncing electoral candidates, some consider themselves totally "ungovernable."
While these students renounce their current president and both candidates in the current election, they continually posit that the path to a better life cannot be found in any presidential candidate or in any governmental structure at all. Rather, the "Ungovernable Generation" believes that creative, collective solutions, implemented from the ground up, will build a more just, free, and joyful world. In their rejection of Macron along with Le Pen, the students deny both the regressive nationalism of the right (the National Front's leaders have been accused of anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial), and the unwelcome alternative of continuing with the status quo offered by Macron and his predecessor Hollande.
No matter what happens next, they're likely to fight.
The second round of the French presidential election, from which either Macron or Le Pen will emerge as the new president, will take place on May 7. While Macron is projected to win, the result, of course, is uncertain. What is certain is that these students - who blockade, carry banners, and chant, "Not Marine nor Macon, not homeland nor bosses" - won't be happy about the result. But they also won't stop trying to build the world they want to see.

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All The Major Anti-Government Protests in France Are Led By TEENS

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For over a year, students in France have led massive anti-government protests across the country.

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Last summer, while checking Twitter, Capres Willow, then 18, noticed a particularly jarring video on her feed. The video was of Philando Castile, a black man shot and killed by Minnesota police during a traffic stop while driving with his girlfriend and her four-year-old daughter. Capres, who lives in a suburb of London and is now 19, was outraged by the images she saw of Castile sitting there, bleeding to death in the driver's seat.

"I lost my mom when I was younger and I just remember thinking, 'there's a little girl in the backseat watching [her mother's boyfriend] being killed,'" Capres tells Teen Vogue. Not only was it jarring because she was watching a death happen over Twitter, but "then I'm watching [the] family witness the murder as well, and then nothing is going to happen about [it], like it's OK that this is happening," she adds. "That's what really got me riled up and frustrated me because it was just, like, why? What's going on with the world? I thought we had hope. I thought things were getting better."

At the time, the issue of police brutality was dominating the news cycle in America with not only the death of Philando Castile, but also of Alton Sterling, a black man who was fatally shot by Baton Rouge, Louisiana police. Shaken to the core after watching the video of Castile in particular, a fire lit within Capres, springing her to action. "I was like you know what, I'm tired of everybody just ranting. We need to show the world - and grab media attention - that we are in solidarity with the U.S. and what's going on over there," she says.

Capres took to Facebook to organize a Black Lives Matter protest in Central London that would commence at the Oxford Circus tube station on July 10, 2016. She posted a screenshot of the event page on Twitter, and people immediately began sharing it onto their own accounts. Eventually, it caught the attention of the BBC - they tweeted it out - as well as singer-songwriter, Kehlani, who posted it on her Instagram page.

When July 10th arrived, Capres was nervous having never planned a protest before at that point. On the day, she had simply set out on the London tube wishing for the best. "I [didn't] even have a megaphone," Capres admits. She had only expected a handful of people to show up - 30 at most, she recalls. To her surprise, far more showed up. "I walked out of Oxford Circus station and there's already like 60 people there and I'm like, oh my gosh, what do I do?" A novice protester, let alone organizer, Capres walked up to the police officers on the premise for guidance, to which they instructed her to address the crowd about the day's agenda. Standing on her tippy toes, she shouted into the crowd, "Hello everybody, thank you so much for coming. It's going to be an amazing day!" At that it was. As the day rolled on, a plethora of people joined in on the organized march, cheering and chanting slogans to spread the poignant message of Black Lives Matter. In the end, approximately 3,000 people attended, a feat that still stuns Capres.

In the days after the protest, Capres received a range of responses from the public, including messages from people who had put on events in their own communities after being inspired by her. While the feedback was overwhelmingly positive, she did receive some negativity from someone expressing their skepticism about her being an inexperienced teenager involved in a critical global movement, Capres recalls. Thankfully, she hasn't let those negative comments deter her, knowing all too well the importance of being civically engaged no matter your age.

Now a university student at Goldsmiths, University of London, studying sociology and anthropology, Capres is committed to expanding her knowledge and understanding of race relations and pressing humanitarian issues. Having organized a widely-attended protest as a teenager, Capres is a prime example of the immense power young people have in bringing to light the civil rights issues of our time.
Related:

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Meet the Teen Who Organized a Black Lives Matter Protest Attended By THOUSANDS of People

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Rising activist Capres Willow Turner talked to Teen Vogue about the surreal experience of organizing a #BlackLivesMatter protest in London when she was just 18-years-old.

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To determine TIME's annual list, we consider accolades across numerous fields, global impact through social media and overall ability to drive news. In the past, we've recognized everyone from singer Lorde to golf champion Lydia Ko to political activist Joshua Wong. Here's who made this year's cut (ordered from youngest to oldest):

Contact us at letters@time.com.

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TIME's annual list of the teens who influenced music, TV, sports, business and more

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o determine TIME's annual list, we consider accolades across numerous fields, global impact through social media and overall ability to drive news. In the past, we've recognized everyone from singer Lorde to Olympic champion Simone Biles to political activist Joshua Wong. Here's who made this year's cut (ordered from youngest to oldest):
Marley Dias, 13
When Marley Dias was in the sixth grade, she encountered a problem: "At home I always got to see black girls and diverse experiences being reflected in the books I read," Dias tells TIME. "But at school, I did not have access to those experiences." So Dias, an avid reader, embarked on a mission to collect one thousand books featuring black female protagonists (mostly from donations), and distribute them to communities in need. Since its launch in 2015, #1000BlackGirlBooks has helped distribute more than 11,000 books to libraries, schools and community organizations around the world. And Dias, now a high school freshman, recently published her own book, Marley Dias Gets It Done: And So Can You. Her goal, she says, is to ensure that "kids know that changing the world should not be something that feels imaginary, but something that you have the power to do today and always." -Rachel E. Greenspan
Rishab Jain, 14
Treating cancer requires immense precision: Doctors try to kill all the diseased cells, while sparing as many healthy ones as possible. This can be especially difficult for pancreatic cancer, since the pancreas moves around, and sometimes gets obscured by other organs. In an effort to help solve this problem, Rishab Jain, an eighth grader from Oregon, developed a software tool that, during simulations, was shown to help doctors zero in on the pancreas more accurately, ideally improving treatments. The algorithm won Jain the $25,000 top prize at the Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge in October, and he's now trying to find hospital and physician partners who could help him run a clinical trial to continue testing. "I've gotten to see how doctors can make an immediate difference in people's lives," Jain says, "so I want to continue pursuing that." - Jamie Ducharme
Marsai Martin, 14
At just 14, Marsai Martin has a career that most adults would envy-she's already won two NAACP Image Awards and a Young Artist Award for her role as Diane Johnson on ABC's Emmy-nominated . But her next project, executive producing and starring in Little alongside Issa Rae, a film based on an idea she pitched herself, may well take her to the next level. Martin tells TIME that her passion for performing began as a two-year-old, when her parents were amazed to find her acting out scenes from Dreamgirls. "I think it's been in my blood for a long time," says Martin. Despite not being old enough to vote, Martin campaigned for Stacey Abrams in Georgia and used her platform to encourage her 460,000 Instagram followers to go to the polls. "When you really believe in something," Martin says, "you will stand up for it. You will push for it to become a reality." - Rachel E. Greenspan
Millie Bobby Brown, 14
After rocketing to near-overnight global fame as the Eggo-loving, telekinetic Eleven in Stranger Things, Millie Bobby Brown has emerged as one of Hollywood's hottest young stars, with a host of A-list superfans, including Drake, Karlie Kloss and Aaron Paul, and an online following of more than 18 million people. In 2018, a year in which a season of Stranger Things will not air, she became the youngest person to ever be named one of TIME's 100 most influential people as well as a UNICEF goodwill ambassador. And her star is only just beginning to rise. Brown is already set to make her feature film debut in the 2019 Godzilla sequel, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, reprise that role in 2020's Godzilla vs. Kong, and both produce and star in a film series based on Nancy Springer's Enola Holmes Mysteries novels.-Megan McCluskey
Storm Reid, 15
In Ava DuVernay's diverse re-imagining of A Wrinkle in Time, which premiered earlier this year, Reid appeared alongside Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon and Mindy Kaling as the main character, Meg Murry-a role that Reid told the Washington Post allowed her to "represent girls who look like me and let them know they can do anything." Now the self-described "future filmmaker"-who made her feature film debut in 12 Years a Slave at age 10-is not only set to star in another of DuVernay's hotly anticipated projects, the Netflix miniseries Central Park Five, but also the 2019 Blumhouse Productions thriller Relive. - Megan McCluskey
Thandiwe Abdullah, 15
As a co-founder of the Black Lives Matter LA Youth Vanguard, Abdullah has become one of her generation's most powerful voices on issues relating to social justice. This year alone, she has advocated for black youth in front of half a million people during the Women's March in Los Angeles and written a widely shared op-ed for Bustle that addressed the need for intersectionality within the Never Again MSD movement. Through the Youth Vanguard, Abdullah also helped create "Black Lives Matter in Schools," a program that aims to end the policing and profiling that black and brown students experience; its agenda was recently adopted this summer by the National Education Association. Now Abdullah is looking to the future, with plans of practicing law and continuing her work as an activist. "I want to change the world's perception of black youth and to empower black youth to claim their own space and demand to have our needs met," Abdullah tells TIME. "I want to transform the systems that we live under from ones that oppress us to ones that empower us." -Cady Lang
Bhad Bhabie, 15
It's hard to imagine a more fitting title for Bhad Bhabie's debut mixtape than 15. The name refers not only to her age, but to the number of minutes her fame might have lasted had she not leveraged viral meme-hood into a legitimate music career. Her public life began in late 2016, when Bhabie (real name: Danielle Bregoli) appeared on an episode of Dr. Phil titled, "I Want To Give Up My Car-Stealing, Knife-Wielding, Twerking 13-Year-Old Daughter Who Tried To Frame Me For A Crime." At one point, the audience booed her, and Bregoli turned to them and shouted, with outsize confidence, "Cash me outside, how 'bout dah?" A meme was born, and eventually, so was a rap career. "When I became famous and realized that I could literally do whatever I wanted," Bregoli says, "music was the first thing I wanted to do." In September 2017, she signed a multi-million dollar deal with Atlantic Records, and with her recent single, " These Heaux," Bregoli became the youngest female rapper ever to chart on the Billboard Hot 100. Next up: a Snapchat reality show. And while Bregoli is floored that she's gone from spending some nights sleeping on the floor of a trailer to being one of this year's popular Halloween costumes, she recognizes that she's not exactly a role model. "Y'all can dress like me," she says. "Just don't act like me." - Eliza Berman
Greta Thunberg, 15
Before Sweden's general elections in September, Thunberg went on a three-week strike from school in an effort to urge her government to act on climate change. "I thought that nothing is happening and no one is doing anything - it is my moral duty to do what I can," she tells TIME of her mission. "I cannot vote, so this is a way that I can make my voice heard." Since then, Thunberg has inspired hundreds of similar school strikes around the world, including a mass school walkout in Australia. She has also been nominated for an international prize for her activism and recently met with the U.N. Secretary General at the COP24 climate summit in Poland. She plans to strike every Friday until Sweden is aligned with the Paris Agreement on climate change; while the Scandinavian country is one of only a handful in Europe actively pursuing policies to meet the climate goals, Thunberg says it is not enough. In October, she took her message to a crowd of more than 10,000 at a climate change demonstration in Helsinki. "Instead of worrying about the future, you should try to change it while you still can." - Suyin Haynes
NCT Dream, 16-19
With their synchronized choreography, bold aesthetic and dynamic performances bridging rap and song, seven-member K-pop group NCT Dream may appear similar to other rising boy bands from South Korea. But the group boasts a special feature: It consists only of members below the age of 20, as it's fashioned as the youth subunit of umbrella group NCT. Together, Mark, Renjun, Jeno, Haechan, Jaemin, Chenle and Jisung made headlines this year when their mini-album, "We Go Up," peaked at #5 on Billboard's World Albums chart and topped iTunes Albums charts in 15 countries. A big part of the group's appeal is that they connect with teenagers, as teenagers. "More than just putting on a performance with great visuals and choreography, we really want our music to be a reflection of the thoughts and struggles that teens our age go through," Mark tells TIME. The group's title tracks have followed a narrative of the stages of adolescence, transitioning from innocence to rebellion-and growth. "For the older fans, I hope that NCT Dream could be a group that helps them reminisce and look back on their younger selves," Haechan says. - Kat Moon
Billie Eilish, 16
Billie Eilish was just trying to send some music to her dance teacher when she uploaded "Ocean Eyes," a song she recorded with her brother, to Soundcloud in 2016. Now, two years after that track went viral, Eilish is a rising star in the music industry. Her songs have been streamed more than 2.5 billion times and her first North American tour sold out within minutes. The Los Angeles teen, who comes from a family of creatives, projects an intimidating image-she cries black tears in a music video, sings from the perspective of a serial killer and the first song she ever wrote was about the zombie apocalypse. But behind the brooding expression, she says, she's "a little flower," never more humbled than when a fan is moved by her music. She hopes someday to direct music videos and design everything from shoes to cars. "I can't imagine a life that doesn't involve creativity," she says, "or at least inspiring other people." - Eliza Berman
Isabel and Melati Wijsen, 16, 17
Melati and Isabel Wijsen were swimming in the waters of Bali when they noticed something that didn't belong: floating plastic bags. And so in 2013, at ages 12 and 10, the sisters from Indonesia launched Bye Bye Plastic Bags to raise awareness about the issue. Their profile has risen considerably since then. This year, they organized Bali's Biggest Clean-up, with 20,000 people collecting 65 tons of waste; they also helped get 350 local businesses to commit to eliminating the use of everyday plastic products like cups and straws within the next two years. Beyond their home island, Bye Bye Plastic Bags has also met with policy makers, like South Korea's Minister of Environment, and spoken at environmental conferences, like the UN-sponsored International Marine Debris Conference in San Diego. But what the sisters value most is being able to give talks in classrooms. "Our golden moment and cherry on-top is definitely seeing when we can mobilize and activate young people," Melati says. - Kat Moon
Ahed Tamimi, 17
Even when it's not in the headlines, the Israeli-Arab conflict grinds on along a thousand points of friction, including the weekly protest at the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh. Each Friday, Palestinians gather to march toward a nearby spring taken over by Jewish settlers. Israeli soldiers confront the march, answering stones with tear gas and rubber bullets. On Dec. 15, 2017, Ahed Tamimi slapped a soldier's face-an action that earned her both jail time (she turned 17 in an Israeli prison) and, once a video went viral, international recognition. Now Tamimi is being hailed as a leader in a new generation of Palestinian nationalism and urges a new approach to ending the 51-year Israeli occupation. "I didn't do anything wrong that I should regret," Ahed told the New York Times, who plans to study law and confront Israel in international courts. "At the end of the day, the soldier came to my house. I didn't go to his house." - Karl Vick
Tania Speaks, 17
Tania Speaks never thought that an emergency room visit she made as a child would be the genesis of her future as an entrepreneur. But a decision she made from a place of pain-cutting off her eyebrows after years of being bullied for their full, bushy shape-led to the idea that changed everything for her. When she returned to school only to find that the bullies were now harassing her for the scars where her eyebrows once were, she decided to grow them back. She tried several different products she picked up at the drug store. But, dissatisfied with the results, she decided to experiment with her own concoctions. She researched organic ingredients like aloe vera and vitamin E and set up a workstation in her living room for mixing different solutions, which she tested on herself. When rave reviews came in from family members, she began selling the product out of her high school bathroom, launching Brow Boost in 2016 and later adding a product for facial hair. After taking a small loan from her mother, she grew the business by 60% in less than half a year. Now in college studying entrepreneurship, she hopes to launch new companies in the future. But even as she looks forward, she never forgets where her story began. She shares her journey with children, speaking at elementary and middle schools, where she encourages victims of bullying to channel their energy into hobbies they love. Recently, one child burst into tears telling Speaks how much her words meant during a lonely time. "I treasure these moments," she says. "Every kid I can inspire is enough to keep me going." - Eliza Berman
The Parkland students, 18-19
In the immediate aftermath of the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., which claimed the lives of 17 students and teachers on Valentine's Day, a group of young survivors emerged as some of the nation's most prominent voices for gun reform. Furious over the deaths of their peers, the student activists-who include Emma González, Jaclyn Corin and David Hogg-launched the March For Our Lives movement and organized a historic rally against gun violence in March in Washington, D.C., which drew tens of thousands of people and earned them a tribute from President Obama in this year's TIME 100. In June, the Parkland students embarked on a national bus tour, signing young people up to vote during multiple stops they made in at least 27 states in two months. The teens directly registered more than 50,000 people for November's midterm elections, many of whom were first-time voters. "It's not about empowering people," says Corin, 18, of the students' efforts. "It's about making them realize they already have that power in them." - Melissa Chan
Kavya Kopparapu, 18
In 2017, Kopparapu, now a freshman at Harvard University, was reading a story about the late Sen. John McCain, who was battling the aggressive brain cancer known as glioblastoma. What stuck with Kopparapu was the part of the story that mentioned that in the past 30 years, the survival rate for the disease has barely budged. "I thought, Why is that?" she says. "We have so much innovation that it didn't make sense that we hadn't gotten better." So she set out to change things, developing a deep-learning computer system that can scan slides of tissue from brain cancer patients looking for differences in density, color, texture and cellular alignment that are unique to that particular person's case. The goal: to develop targeted therapies that are also unique to the person. Her system has been awarded a provisional patent, and this year, she hopes to begin clinical tests in collaboration with a neuropathologist at Georgetown University. In addition, she is the founder of the non-profit Girls Computing League, which works this year to bring computing opportunities to girls in the northern Virginia and Washington, DC area. - Jeffrey Kluger
Adut Akech, 18
Since making her high-fashion debut just two years ago, Adut Akech has become one of the fashion industry's most sought-after young models. It's a future she hardly predicted for herself: Born in South Sudan, Akech spent her childhood in Kenya's Kakuma refugee camp before moving to Adelaide, Australia, where she was scouted by local agencies, eventually signing with Sydney-based Chadwick Models. Akech, who was recently nominated for the 2018 Model of the Year by the British Fashion Awards, credits supporters like supermodel Naomi Campbell and British Vogue editor Edward Enninful-who put her on the cover of the magazine's December issue-for helping to pave the way for her success. She's also vocal about paying it forward, whether that means speaking out about the need for diversity in fashion, combating issues like poverty or amplifying the stories of fellow refugees. "I hope that with every 'achievement,' I can also give back in some way, whether it is giving a voice and hope to refugees around the world or simply inspiring other youth like myself to continue doing our best," she tells TIME. - Cady Lang
Jace Norman, 18
To most of his fans, Jace Norman is known as superhero sidekick Kid Danger on the hit Nickelodeon television series Henry Danger. But in the past two years, he's been branching out offscreen, as well-a decision he says was spurred by hanging out on the Henry Danger set. "I would stay after work and watch the writers produce the show," he tells TIME. Last year, Norman started his own social-media marketing company, Creator Edge, which recently partnered with Viacom to create a series of original content; he also has two shows in the works, one he is producing and one he will star in. His advice to other aspiring young entrepreneurs: stay humble. "Being a kind person and not expecting anything to come to you has a way of making people more willing to help you," he says. - Wilder Davies
Chloe Kim, 18
Snowboarding superstar Chloe Kim had already clinched an Olympic gold medal when she entered the halfpipe for her final run in Pyeongchang. She could have waltzed her way down the pipe and enjoyed a coronation for becoming the youngest woman to ever win the event's gold medal. Instead, she risked life and limb to land back-to-back 1080s-three full revolutions in the air per trick. "I really wanted to do my best run possible and knew I would have regretted if I didn't," Kim, 19, e-mails TIME from her training base in Switzerland. "So yah I am happy." She remains in top form: In July, ESPN named Kim Best Female Athlete at its ESPYs award show, and in October, she nailed her first "frontside double cork 1080"-two diagonal flips while spinning 1080 degrees-while training in Switzerland. - Sean Gregory
Jack Cable, 18
Jack Cable is a rising star in the world of white hat hackers-programmers who use their technical expertise to find and report bugs and vulnerabilities instead of exploiting them. Three years ago, the 18 year old got his first taste of bug bounty hunting after finding a vulnerability in a cryptocurrency site, one that allowed him to withdraw money from people's accounts simply by entering a negative number. "I knew that definitely shouldn't happen," says Cable, who reported the bug. He's since taken first place in various competitions, including the U.S. Department of Defense's Hack the Air Force program. Last October, Cable flew to Kyiv, Ukraine, and won the HackIT Cup where Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak presented him with his award. Now a student at Stanford University, Cable has started his own firm, Lightning Security, and works with cryptocurrency companies to shore up their protection against malicious behavior. "Ten years ago, people would go to jail for stuff like this...there's no way I would've gotten the same response," he says. - Patrick Lucas Austin
Amika George, 19
Last December, nearly 2,000 people showed up for a protest outside U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May's home, led by 18-year-old Amika George. Her goal: convince policymakers to end "period poverty," as she calls it, by funding the distribution of menstrual products to girls and women who can't afford them. "It really upset me," she tells TIME of learning that many girls in the U.K. were routinely missing school during their periods because they couldn't afford to buy menstrual products. "The government knew this was happening on their watch, but they were refusing to find a solution." She launched the #FreePeriods campaign as a response, gathering nearly 200,000 signatures on her petition to help eradicate period poverty; the movement eventually garnered the support of over a dozen U.K. policymakers, galvanizing the government to allocate funds to the issue for the first time. But George, who was honored with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's Goalkeepers Campaign Award this fall, says she is just getting started. "We can't trust our policymakers to take action on issues that seem so obvious to us," she says. "If we want to see change, it falls on us to create that change." - Raisa Bruner
Margielyn Didal, 19
This summer, the 19 year old from Cebu City, Philippines, won the gold medal in women's street skateboarding competition at the Asian Games-and became a national hero in the process. "We didn't even have a street skating park where I grew up," says Margielyn. Speaking to TIME from Bangkok where she was holding a skate demo, Didal credits her family and her girlfriend with keeping her motivated to skate. One of five siblings, she started competing-and placing-in competitive events without even owning her own skateboard, to the initial dismay of her mother, a street food vendor, and her father, a carpenter. "At first, my parents didn't support me as much because skating wasn't seen as a 'girly thing,' but they 100% support me now," she says. Since Didal's triumph, Cebu's mayor pledged to build a new dedicated skatepark in her honor, with her input. Now, Didal is looking ahead to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, where skateboarding will be included as an athletic event for the first time. "It's going to be the big goal in my life to get that gold medal," she tells TIME. That medal would be the Philippines' first Olympic gold and would help cement skateboarding's status as a serious sport in the country. "I want to build a new generation of skaters for the future." - Suyin Haynes
Kylian Mbappé, 19
The future of the world's most popular sport rests on the fleet foot of a French teenager. Kylian Mbappé, 19, enthralled soccer fans at the 2018 World Cup in Russia, as he danced through defenses on the way to leading Les Bleus to their first title in two decades. Mbappé became the first teen since the legendary Pelé, 60 years ago, to score a goal in the World Cup final. But his actions resonated far beyond the soccer pitch. As the son of African immigrants and product of one of the low-income banlieus, or suburbs that surround Paris, the young phenom-who plays professionally for the club Paris Saint-Germain-also represents hope for a more inclusive Europe. - Sean Gregory
Kiernan Shipka, 19
Many child actors make their names in kiddie fare, but it seems appropriate that an old soul like Kiernan Shipka got her big break, at six, on Mad Men-perhaps the most grown-up hit in TV history. Even in early seasons, Shipka's Sally Draper fused her mom's petulance with her dad's inscrutability to uncanny effect. This fall, on the heels of juicy roles in FX's Feud and indie chiller The Blackcoat's Daughter, she stepped into the pointy shoes of Archie Comics' teen witch Sabrina Spellman, in Netflix's dark teen drama Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. And the character has already resonated with Shipka's politically aware peers: "She's a woke witch," Shipka told Variety. "She's a strong independent woman and she stands up for herself and she does what she thinks is right." - Judy Berman
Sheku Kanneh-Mason, 19
Millions first encountered Sheku Kanneh-Mason during the Royal Wedding, at which the cello prodigy was personally chosen by Prince Harry and Meghan Markle to play while they stepped out to sign their registry. (Social media affectionately dubbed him #cellobae.) But even before then, the teenage Brit was making waves in classical music: In 2016, Kanneh-Mason became the first black musician to win the BBC's prestigious Young Musician of the Year award. Since then, he has released a record-setting classical album, announced an international tour, and continued to bring new fans to classical music. "The music itself can appeal to anyone," he says. "It's just a case of people having the chance to hear it or see it." - Casey Quackenbush
Joey King, 19
Joey King's Instagram followers shot up from 600,000 to 6 million after the massively popular teen rom-com, The Kissing Booth, premiered on Netflix in May. Most of her newfound fans are teen girls, but not all. "I was on an airplane from Istanbul," she says, "and a 73-year-old Turkish man recognized me from the movie." As the star of the film, King has had to answer critics who say that The Kissing Booth promotes sexist tropes. (At one point, her character gets slut-shamed by the school principal after being groped, while her love interest is lionized for fist-fighting the groper.) "I agree that our movie shows bad behavior towards women," she says. "But I think the lesson is that you shouldn't be the guy who grabs girl's butts." On social media, King uses platform to shine a light on issues like sex trafficking and gun control: "Now that I am of voting age and have educated myself politically, I feel inclined to share what I've learned with people who may look up to me." - Eliana Dockterman

Correction, Dec. 10: The original version of this story misstated Kylian Mbappé's last name. It is Mbappé, not Mpabbé.

Correction, Dec. 11: The original version of this story misstated a nickname for France's national football team. It is Les Bleus, not Les Bluès.

Contact us at letters@time.com.

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TIME's 25 Most Influential Teens of 2018

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o determine TIME's annual list, we consider accolades across numerous fields, global impact through social media and overall ability to drive news. In the past, we've recognized everyone from singer Lorde to Olympic champion Simone Biles to political activist Joshua Wong.

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To determine TIME's annual list, we consider accolades across numerous fields, global impact through social media and overall ability to drive news. In the past, we've recognized everyone from singer Lorde to Olympic champion Simone Biles to political activist Joshua Wong. Here's who made this year's cut (ordered from youngest to oldest):

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Contact us at letters@time.com.

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Meet the 30 Most Influential Teens of 2017

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To determine TIME's annual list, we consider accolades across numerous fields, global impact through social media and overall ability to drive news. In the past, we've recognized everyone from singer Lorde to Olympic champion Simone Biles to political activist Joshua Wong. Here's who made this year's cut (ordered from youngest to oldest): Get The Brief.

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Teens care about more than just dating, going out on a Friday night and getting their driver's licenses. Some teens are taking action on big initiatives, like putting an end to global warming. Learn how Alec Loorz from the iMatter movement is working to help save the earth.

Alec Loorz makes your average 40-year-old, stay-at-home mom really re-think her bucket list.

By age 18, he had sued the U.S. government, trained with Al Gore, shared philosophies with the daughter of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and inspired tens of thousands of youth from 45 countries and more than 200 cities to march in their streets with a unified message - "Our future matters!"

Alec and his mother, Victoria, launched Kids vs Global Warming when Alec was only 13 years old. The iMatter Campaign, an initiative of Kids vs Global Warming, began in 2009. Its mission is to "empower youth to become the voice of the climate crisis so that our society wakes up and actually begins to live as if our future matters."

Alec says he didn't set out to spark a movement. "I just did what I felt I needed to do to raise awareness that my generation's future was at stake, and we all need to be involved in bringing about a new way of living if we are going to survive," he explains. "I guess that really resonated with people."

Youth passion needs matching funds

The iMatter Youth Council (iMYC) is an international team of young leaders who act as spokespeople for their generation through school presentations, speeches, videos, blogs and articles. But iMYC isn't just talk.

Members also organize marches and meet with government officials. The goal is to change the way people think, live and act.

But big goals often need big budgets - and that's where iMatter struggles.

"We need to build infrastructure and raise funds to keep up with the momentum," says Victoria Loorz, Alec's mother and the executive director of iMatter. "It's a huge challenge. I know there are many people out there who would want to join us in our work, but it's a skill we're still learning."

Climate crisis is "moral issue"

While Al Gore inspired much of Alec's philosophy on climate change, iMatter hopes to differentiate itself from the liberal pigeonhole into which many environmental organizations find themselves plunged.

"The climate crisis is not a political issue," Victoria says. "In fact, it's not even an environmental issue. It's a moral issue. But corporate money from oil interests have made it into a political one."

Akilah Sanders-Reed, 18, is an iMatter youth council member and student at Macalester College. She has been a climate activist since she was about 14 years old.

"Climate action isn't some strange litmus test for how liberal or conservative a person is," Akilah says. "It's a test of a person's commitment to every young and future American, and every citizen of the planet."

Adult support, partnership is key

In addition to recruiting Republicans, iMatter hopes to attract individuals with large fan bases to help organically expand iMatter's reach. While growing funding and reach are paramount, iMatter's long-term goal is "to see some actual change in our political system to reduce carbon emissions as prescribed by scientists to bring down carbon levels to 350 ppm," explains Valerie Serrels, mother to three teens who have worked with iMatter. Valerie is also coordinator of the iMatter youth council for Kids vs Global Warming.

While Kids vs Global Warming is primarily driven by youth, the organization says it strives to involve parents and plans to launch a mentor program this year. "Elders are needed as much as youth are," says Victoria, Alec's mother. "Both need to be honored, supported and mobilized together."

Grant Serrels, 17, is an iMatter youth council member and Valerie's son. He describes why he believes this youth movement is poised to succeed.

"The unique thing about youth leadership as part of the climate movement is that our voices represent future generations and put focus on the need to change the way we live, act, use, abuse and profit from our environment," he says. "History has shown us that a movement of young people can bring change."

In 50 years, Larry King will be dead, "but I won't be"

Alec says his passion is especially fueled by people who tell him something cannot be done.

"I love it when people tell me that!" he says. "It makes me mad and I have to prove them wrong. Larry King stated the problem plainly... a few years ago [when he said], 'Nobody cares about what's going to happen in 50 years.'"

"Well that's easy for him to say, he'll be dead," Alec points out. "But I won't be. Our children won't be. This planet won't be. So I believe that it is up to us - the youngest generation - to stand up and ignite a movement that will change the mindset of every person on this planet.

"In fact, I believe it's what we were born to do."

More about kids making a difference
8 Earth Day traditions kids will love
What your kids should know about global warming
Volunteering opportunities for teens

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Teens vs Global Warming's iMatter movement rallies youth worldwide to change the way people think, live and act.

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Teenagers get a lot of bad rap for being lazy, self-centred and making poor decisions.

Sure there are some teens like that, but there are also a lot of adults who could be described the same way.

And there are some young people who have done remarkable things before the age of 20, which many of us would be proud to have achieved in a lifetime.

These young people are seeing the problems in the world and doing something to change them.

They are inventing, campaigning and challenging what's around them to make a brighter future.

Here are six incredible people under 20 who have already helped change the world.

Malala Yousafzai, 18

You should of heard of Malala Yousafzai by now, but her remarkable story is worth telling again.

Born in Pakistan, Malala inherited her father's love of education. Like him, she became a campaigner against the Taliban's efforts to stop girls going to school.

In 2009, she started writing for the BBC Urdu service about her concerns in the area.

She began to get death threats as she received international recognition for her efforts to promote education in the region.

Malala was shot in the head on her way home from school by members of the Taliban in 2013.

She survived the attack, which received worldwide condemnation and sparked protests across Pakistan. In the aftermath, millions signed a right to education petition which led to Pakistan's first Right To Free and Compulsory Education Bill.

She became the youngest recipient of Nobel Peace Prize in 2014 and still campaigns for girls' right to education around the world with the Malala Fund.

MORE : Malala Yousafzai becomes the youngest person ever to accept a Nobel Peace Prize

Easton LaChapelle, 17

Easton LaChappelle made his first robotic hand at the age of 14, using LEGO and fishing wire.

Later, he was further inspired when he met a seven-year-old girl at a science fair. She had a prosthetic hand that only opened and closed, but still cost $80,000 (around £52,000).

He made it his mission to help people like that little girl and decided to create a functional prosthetic limb that cost under $1,000 (around £650).

Using 3D printing technology he's already developed an affordable and functional prototype.

So impressive is his work in the field, that NASA asked him to work on their Robonaut team.

That's right, he's 17 and has already worked for NASA.

He's also a really nice guy because, instead of keeping the tech under wraps and making a load of money, he's shared it with the world so everyone can share, use and build on the design to help make it better.

You can find out more in his Ted Talk.

Jazz Jennings, 15

Jazz Jennings was assigned male at birth, but for as long as she can remember has known she was a girl.

With a supportive family behind her, Jazz has been able to live as the girl she always knew she was.

Which would be a wonderful story in itself, but Jazz has also been an active LGBT campaigner, talking about her experience as a trans child.

And she now has her own reality show, I am Jazz, detailing her life as a trans teen, giving hope and inspiring trans teens all over the world.

She also thinks outside her own experience and has set up the Transkids Purple Rainbow Foundation, which helps give emotional and financial support to transgender youth, many of whom are homeless.

MORE : This Tumblr post perfectly sums up why it should be easy to accept transgender people

Mary Grace Henry, 18

When Mary Grace Henry was just 12-years-old she decided to change the life of an underprivileged girl by funding her education.

She asked for a sewing machine for her birthday and taught herself how to make reversible headbands to sell at school.

Soon, she made enough to put one girl through education. But she didn't stop there.

Since then she has made thousands of hair accessories and has sent 66 girls in Kenya, Uganda, Paraguay and Haiti to school with her programme, Reverse The Course.

When she won a World of Children award, she said: 'Educating a girl can reverse the course of her life, change the course of a community...and a country.'

Yash Gupta, 19

When Yash Gupta broke his glasses one day in a Taekwondo class, he realised how much he relied them on.

With his glasses repaired, he read online that more than 12 million children do not have the corrective eyewear they need.

Having struggled for a short while without them, he couldn't comprehend how some kids went through their whole childhood without seeing properly.

He decided to help bring that number down and, at the age of just 14, he set up Sight Learning.

The organisation collects used glasses and donates them to children who need them.

They've now given more than $1 million worth of glasses to children around the world in Mexico, Honduras, Haiti, and India.

Anoyara Khatun, 18

Anoyara Khatun was forced to do domestic work when her father died, when she was just five-years-old.

At the age of 12 she was sold to a tout and trafficked to do domestic labour for other families.

But Anoyara's spirit was not broken and, after returning back to her home in West Bengal at 13-years-old, she campaigned against child labour and trafficking with a local organisation.

Her efforts have helped hundreds of trafficked children from the region return to their families.

She has also helped stop 35 cases of early marriage by negotiation and pressure on the local government.

Her remarkable work has now been internationally recognised and she has gone on to talk to the UN about the horrific circumstances children like her face every day.

MORE : 'World's most random good samaritan' leaves kind gift for fellow driver

MORE : These women bled onto their white trousers to campaign against tampon tax

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Six people under 20 who've already helped change the world

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There are some young people who have done remarkable things before the age of 20, which many of us would be proud to have achieved in a lifetime, here are six of them.

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One of Mary Grace Henry's favorite quotes is from Mother Teresa:

Not all of us can do great things, but we can all do small things with great love.

- Mother Teresa

Doing small things with great love epitomizes the work of Mary Grace, recipient of our 2014 Youth Award. That combined with an ability to achieve anything she puts her mind to.

"My advice is just to begin," Mary Grace told us. "When you see a need, act. Dream big, but start small, taking little steps."

When she was 12, Mary Grace became determined to change the life of an underprivileged girl by funding her education. She taught herself how to make reversible headbands with a plan to use 100% of the profits to send girls living in extreme poverty to school.

"I realized that the very best tool that would give someone a real chance was one she could use to pursue her own dreams: an education," Mary Grace said.

Undaunted by the fact that she knew nothing about sewing or running a business, Mary Grace got to work. She asked her parents for an early birthday present - a sewing machine, practiced sewing headbands for months, and eventually made enough to sell at her school's bookstore.

Pretty soon, Mary Grace had raised enough money to reach her goal. But she couldn't stop there: so many other girls still did not have access to education.

"The greatest obstacle to education faced by both girls and boys is poverty," Mary Grace said. "Girls, though, face a second hurdle that is far more difficult to address: their culture. In many countries throughout the world, girls are viewed as having not just lesser value than boys, but often devastatingly little or no value."

Today, Mary Grace is the Founder of Reverse The Course, a social business that has sold more than 11,000 hair accessories, through her website and through retail partners in seven states, to fund the education of girls in Kenya, Uganda, Paraguay and Haiti.

Read more below about why Mary Grace started Reverse The Course, and why she doesn't plan on slowing down anytime soon:

1. What do you think is the number one obstacle preventing girls from getting an education?
The greatest obstacle to education faced by both girls and boys is poverty. Girls, though, face a second hurdle that is far more difficult to address: their culture. In many countries throughout the world, girls are viewed as having not just lesser value than boys, but often devastatingly little or no value.

This manifests itself in different ways depending on geography and, in many countries, religion. Girls are aborted because families do not want to pay a dowry; desperately poor families sell their daughters, dooming them to lives chained to a sewing machines 15 hours a day; in many regions, women and girls are used as "free labor;" in places where a woman's value is in the number of children she bears, girls as young as 11 and 12 are married. Families often believe it is better to invest in sons who will remain with them than in daughters who will join their husbands' families.

Though the patriarchal society dominant in so many countries perpetuates the discrimination against girls, the passage of laws mandating primary school education for girls has finally helped put a crack in these barriers.

2. What does it mean to you to win a World of Children?
It means that I am part of something bigger than my dream, part of an entire community that cares deeply about the fate of the most vulnerable: children.

World of Children's network will be a resource in ways I have yet to comprehend. This Award is a seal of approval that will allow us to become more financially stable, ensuring the Foundation's ability to expand and continue our mission to educate girls.

The World of Children Youth Award validates my work as being effective, empowering and life-changing in "reversing the course" of marginalized girls' lives. I am humbled and forever grateful that I've been chosen for this extraordinary honor.

3. Do you have any advice for any other young people who want to start programs for vulnerable children?
One of my favorite quotes is from Mother Teresa: "Not all of us can do great things, but we can all do small things with great love."

My advice is to just begin. When you see a need, act. Dream big, but start small, taking little steps. Set an initial goal and don't scare yourself thinking about the "what ifs." Each step taken will present both new opportunities and new challenges. Face each one as it comes and then keep going. All those little steps, done with love, will lead you to places impossible to imagine.

4. With all that you have accomplished, could you share one moment that has stuck with you?
Growing up, I was always talking about what I wanted to be. I spent a year wanting to be an artist, another a teacher, several years envisioning myself as an astronaut.

When I asked Barbara Lee Shaw, the Founder of the Maasai Girls Education Fund, to find out what our students wanted to be, I expected to hear similar answers.

A month later, Barbara called me to say that when the girls were asked to write me a little note answering my question, they sat looking at the discussion leader, Lucy, silently. When she repeated the request, one girl raised her hand and asked what did "to be" mean. As Lucy explained, one girl looked shocked and said she never thought she could be anything except what the village elders told her to be. Another girl began to cry as she thought about all the possibilities before her. That was when I fully comprehended my work was really accomplishing what I hoped: giving girls the chance to define their own dreams.
On November 6, Mary Grace will be honored in New York City with the 2014 World of Children Youth Award at our annual Awards Ceremony along with 5 other extraordinary changemakers for children. Learn more >>

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Interview with Mary Grace Henry, founder of Reverse The Course, World of Children

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One of Mary Grace Henry's favorite quotes is from Mother Teresa: Not all of us can do great things, but we can all do small things with great love. - Mother Teresa Doing small things with great love epitomizes the work of Mary Grace, recipient of our 2014 Youth Award.

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Malala Marches Toward the Nobel Peace Prize | TIME.com

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This Friday, the Nobel committee announces the 2013 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. As far as global opinion is concerned, the award is a 16-year-old Pakistani girl’s to lose.

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The historical figure of importance, Iqbal Masih was a young Pakistani boy who was forced into bonded labor at age four. After being freed at age ten, Iqbal became an activist against bonded child labor. He became a martyr for his cause when he was murdered at age 12.

Overview of Iqbal Masih

Iqbal Masih was born in Muridke, a small, rural village outside of Lahore in Pakistan. Shortly after Iqbal's birth, his father, Saif Masih, abandoned the family. Iqbal's mother, Inayat, worked as a housecleaner but found it difficult to make enough money to feed all her children from her small income.

Iqbal, too young to understand his family's problems, spent his time playing in the fields near his two-room house. While his mom was away at work, his older sisters took care of him. His life changed drastically when he was just four years old.

In 1986, Iqbal's older brother was to be married and the family needed money to pay for a celebration. For a very poor family in Pakistan, the only way to borrow money is to ask a local employer. These employers specialize in this kind of barter, where the employer loans family money in exchange for the bonded labor of a small child.

To pay for the wedding, Iqbal's family borrowed 600 rupees (about $12) from a man who owned a carpet-weaving business. In return, Iqbal was required to work as a carpet weaver until the debt was paid off. Without being asked or consulted, Iqbal was sold into bondage by his family.

Workers Fighting for Survival

This system of peshgi (loans) is inherently inequitable; the employer has all the power. Iqbal was required to work an entire year without wages in order to learn the skills of a carpet weaver. During and after his apprenticeship, the cost of the food he ate and the tools he used were all added to the original loan. When and if he made mistakes, he was often fined, which also added to the loan.

In addition to these costs, the loan grew ever larger because the employer added interest. Over the years, Iqbal's family borrowed even more money from the employer, which was added to the amount of money Iqbal had to work off. The employer kept track of the loan total. It was not unusual for employers to pad the total, keeping the children in bondage for life. By the time Iqbal was ten years old, the loan had grown to 13,000 rupees (about $260).

The conditions in which Iqbal worked were horrendous. Iqbal and the other bonded children were required to squat on a wooden bench and bend forward to tie millions of knots into carpets. The children were required to follow a specific pattern, choosing each thread and tying each knot carefully. The children were not allowed to speak to each other. If the children started to daydream, a guard might hit them or they might cut their own hands with the sharp tools they used to cut the thread.

Iqbal worked six days a week, at least 14 hours a day. The room in which he worked was stifling hot because the windows could not be opened in order to protect the quality of the wool. Only two light bulbs dangled above the young children.

If the children talked back, ran away, were homesick, or were physically sick, they were punished. Punishment included severe beatings, being chained to their loom, extended periods of isolation in a dark closet, and being hung upside down. Iqbal often did these things and received numerous punishments. For all this, Iqbal was paid 60 rupees (about 20 cents) a day after his apprenticeship had ended.

The Bonded Labor Liberation Front

After working six years as a carpet weaver, Iqbal one day heard about a meeting of the Bonded Labor Liberation Front (BLLF) which was working to help children like Iqbal. After work, Iqbal snuck away to attend the meeting. At the meeting, Iqbal learned that the Pakistani government had outlawed peshgi in 1992. In addition, the government canceled all outstanding loans to these employers.

Shocked, Iqbal knew he wanted to be free. He talked to Eshan Ullah Khan, president of the BLLF, who helped him get the paperwork he needed to show his employer that he should be free. Not content to just be free himself, Iqbal worked to also get his fellow workers free.

Once free, Iqbal was sent to a BLLF school in Lahore. Iqbal studied very hard, finishing four years of work in just two. At the school, Iqbal's natural leadership skills became increasingly apparent and he became involved in demonstrations and meetings that fought against bonded child labor. He once pretended to be one of a factory's workers so that he could question the children about their work conditions. This was a very dangerous expedition, but the information he gathered helped close down the factory and free hundreds of children.

Iqbal began speaking at BLLF meetings and then to international activists and journalists. He spoke about his own experiences as a bonded child laborer. He was not intimidated by crowds and spoke with such conviction that many took notice of him.

Iqbal's six years as a bonded child had affected him physically as well as mentally. The most noticeable thing about Iqbal was that he was an extremely small child, about half the size he should have been at his age. At age ten, he was less than four feet tall and weighed a mere 60 pounds. His body had stopped growing, which one doctor described as "psychological dwarfism." Iqbal also suffered from kidney problems, a curved spine, bronchial infections, and arthritis. Many say that he shuffled his feet when he walked because of pain.

In many ways, Iqbal was made into an adult when he was sent to work as a carpet weaver. But he was not really an adult. He lost his childhood, but not his youth. When he went to the U.S. to receive the Reebok Human Rights Award, Iqbal loved watching cartoons, especially Bugs Bunny. Once in a while, he also had a chance to play some computer games while in the U.S.

A Life Cut Short

Iqbal's growing popularity and influence caused him to receive numerous death threats. Focused on helping other children become free, Iqbal ignored the letters.

On Sunday, April 16, 1995, Iqbal spent the day visiting his family for Easter. After spending some time with his mother and siblings, he headed over to visit his uncle. Meeting up with two of his cousins, the three boys rode a bike to his uncle's field to bring his uncle some dinner. On the way, the boys stumbled upon someone who shot at them with a shotgun. Iqbal died immediately. One of his cousins was shot in the arm; the other wasn't hit.

How and why Iqbal was killed remains a mystery. The original story was that the boys stumbled upon a local farmer who was in a compromising position with a neighbor's donkey. Frightened and perhaps high on drugs, the man shot at the boys, not intending to specifically kill Iqbal. Most people do not believe this story. Rather, they believe that leaders of the carpet industry disliked the influence Iqbal was having and ordered him murdered. As of yet, there is no proof that this was the case.

On April 17, 1995, Iqbal was buried. There were approximately 800 mourners in attendance.

*The problem of bonded child labor continues today. Millions of children, especially in Pakistan and India, work in factories to make carpets, mud bricks, beedis (cigarettes), jewelry, and clothing, all with similar horrific conditions as Iqbal experienced.

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Iqbal Masih was a young Pakistani boy who became an activist against bonded child labor. He became a martyr for his cause when he was murdered at age 12.