Ricky and Rishana Amar

Brother and sister team, Ricky and Rishana Amar of Miramar, Florida founded Random Acts of Good Deeds (RAGD), a non-profit organization championing youth leadership and encouraging social responsibility. RAGD collaborates with other NGOs and social programs that uplift and assist others physically and emotionally.

Ricky and Rishana started in 2009 with helping a nonprofit build schools for children by donating funds collected from saving their dollars. This led to the team encouraging their friends to come together to do small national community projects like clean up campaigns.

In 2011, RAGD adopted the Break the Silence Campaign from the University of the West Indies Trinidad and UNICEF to spread awareness about child sexual abuse. The campaign encourages schools, community groups and nonprofits to form networks focused on the cause, and to organize activities annually for April Child Abuse Awareness month and November 20, Universal Children’s Day.

Ricky and Rishana’s personal creed is I am not too young to make a difference. Their mission is to get all their friends to get involved in volunteering and contributing to help build a better world.

Rachel Pavelka

Rachel Pavelka of Oxford, Nebraska teaches youth entrepreneurship skills. Pavelka promotes owning your own business, but also promotes giving back to your community through volunteer work. This past summer, Pavelka engaged 83 teens in classes that help them explore the possibilities of owning their own business. She collaborated with local organizations such as the YMCA and 4-H to teach entrepreneurial camps. Being a young entrepreneur herself, Pavelka wants to ensure other young members of the community have the knowledge to start companies if they choose to do so.

Lia Haile

In 2012, Lia Haile of Manitowoc, Wisconsin founded the Hopeful Hearts Club to assist families at a local homeless shelter, the Hope House. The Hopeful Hearts Club consists of more than 350 volunteers who generously give their time, talents, and treasure to help homeless families in Manitowoc.

Haile, a fourth grader at Stangel Elementary School, organizes birthday parties for the children at the shelter. In addition, she creates welcome home bags containing toiletry items for each child who walks through the doors of the shelter. Each month, Haile coordinates family fun events like ice cream socials, movie nights, pizza parties, and the club purchases backpacks and school supplies for every homeless child enrolled school. Haile works with local businesses to obtain goods and services at a discount. She gives speeches at local schools, businesses and churches about her Hopeful Hearts Club and homelessness,

Eliza Antonowich

Eliza Antonowich of Norcross, Georgia is making great strides in her community by creating opportunities for her peers and community members to become physically active and equipping them with the necessary tools and resources to make healthy choices.

Prior to entering ninth grade, Antonowich stepped up to serves as the race director for the Norcross High School Blue Devils Run, a 5K fun run which raises much needed funds. The funds raised allow students experiencing financial hardship to participate in high school sport activities. The annual run events have been so successful under Antonowich’s leadership that over 100 runners are able to cover the cost of participation fees. In addition, the funds cover team uniforms, meet fees, and end of the year banquets to celebrate teammate’s accomplishments.

Motivated by her experience as a race director, Antonowich decided to initiate a speaker series during the summer prior to starting tenth grade. The speaker series features physical therapists and nutritionists from Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta.

Now a high school sophomore, Antonowich is continuously exploring opportunities to support and sustain her healthy initiatives, and has begun collaborating with local organizations, such as Big Peach Outreach, which anonymously provided running equipment to students. This past fall, she made race bib boards and sold them at local races, gyms, and retail stores. She donated a portion of the proceeds to a local YMCA to fund before and after school programs for youth, enabling them to use the facility for sports.

Antonowich’s passion for her work comes from her love of running and desire to breakdown financial barriers thus leveling the playing field allowing everyone a chance to pursue a healthy lifestyle.

Arianna Cooper

Arianna Cooper of Beltsville, Maryland is an advocate for bullying prevention and child safety.

In the fall of 2013, Cooper coordinated the Walk to Protect Children held on Make a Difference Day. Cooper’s efforts raised funds to benefit The Good Knight Child Empowerment Network. The donations obtained allow the organization to continue to offer free bullying and child safety programs to the community and schools.

In addition to raising funds, Cooper motivated over 20 youth to create walk teams consisting of three to ten walkers to support the organization’s efforts on Make A Difference Day. Cooper ensured that youth participants received information about the Good Knight Safety program and shared the Good Knight ABCs of Safety with other community members.

Cooper began actively volunteering with the Good Knight Child Empowerment Network Inc. in fourth grade. Over the years, she has dedicated more than 1,650 community service hours to the organization.

Abigail Moorhead

When ninth-grader Abigail Moorhead went to Zambia in 2011 she was excited to hang out with children halfway around the world; she had no idea how much of a lasting impact the children would have on her life.

Abigail, who lives in Houston, traveled to Zambia with her mom on a Family Legacy Mission trip to learn about and help some of the 1 million orphans in the country. During her trip she wrote a daily blog to keep her friends informed of her adventures. From seeing how the orphans lived and interacting with them Abigail was inspired to do more.

“The children that I am trying to help are not just a picture or statistic to me,” says Abigail, 15. “They are actual girls and boys that I have met, gotten to know, kicked a soccer ball with and shared deep discussions about their personal lives. Even after I left Zambia, I couldn’t stop thinking about them.”

When Abigail came back to the United States she learned how her blog and her experiences touched her friends, especially her theater director at Wildfish Theatre, Krysti Wilson. Knowing that Abigail wanted to do more to help the children of Zambia, Wilson suggested they stage a benefit performance. Abigail, who had been acting since she was young, loved the idea.

During the first year Abigail and her fellow actors from Wildfish Theatre held three Voices for Zambia concerts with a total of 300 people in attendance. At each concert Abigail told her story of the children she met and how Voices for Zambia got started. Several musical acts were performed and other kids told their experiences of traveling to Zambia and meeting the children.

Abigail stays in touch with the children she’s met through writing, and she returns to Zambia every year to participate in the summer program.

“Seeing the kids again is amazing. They run up and attack me, yelling ‘Auntie Abigail!’ she says. “I get to see how they’ve grown physically and mentally. Some of them, who could not speak English the first time I met them, are speaking and writing to me in English one year later. It is very exciting and rewarding.”

Since Voices for Zambia’s inaugural concert three years ago, the group has put together 10 concerts and reached an audience of more than 1,000 people. This year Abigail has another set of concerts planned and is including a larger location for the event. Some members of the audience were so inspired by Abigail’s work they decided to create their own shows in other cities to raise money for Zambian orphans and have invited Abigail to perform in them.

Voices for Zambia has raised more than $100,000 in donations and 75 orphaned children have been sponsored by the people who have attended the concerts. The money was used to help build a home and provide support for some of the orphans and the sponsorships have allowed children living on the streets to attend private school.

“I think that something like Voices for Zambia shows that even someone my age can do something that really makes a difference in someone else’s life,” Abigail says. “I feel that I have been able to be a voice for these kids that otherwise don’t have a voice.”