Saving the World in Study Hall
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Published: May 11, 2008
Teenagers are supposed to be sullen and self-absorbed, but Rachel S.
Rosenfeld never got the memo.
Rachel is a high school junior in Harrison, N.Y., who came down with a
painful intestinal ailment that forced her to miss the entire 2006-7
school year. So she resolved that if she couldn=92t go to school
herself, she could at least help other kids who wanted to.
=46rom her sickbed, Rachel sold T-shirts and solicited contributions to
build a 316-student elementary school in rural Cambodia. Borrowing an
idea from university fund-raising, she offered naming opportunities:
for $25, donors could buy chairs to be named for them. All told, she
raised $57,000, which was channeled through an aid group, American
Assistance for Cambodia.
Now Rachel is mostly healthy again and back in school, but over the
December vacation she traveled to Cambodia to cut the ribbon at the R.
S. Rosenfeld School.
=93The children were all so grateful and well-behaved,=94 Rachel said.
=93It=
truly was a life-changing experience.=94
College students used to be the activists, but increasingly they=92re
joined by high school pupils and even younger children. The spotlight
may be on billionaire philanthropists like Bill Gates, but one of the
country=92s healthier trends has been the rise of piggy-bank
philanthropists.
Two high school students in Massachusetts, Ana Slavin and Nick
Anderson, started a nationwide high school campaign, Dollars for
Darfur, that has raised $420,000 for the people of Darfur from 440
schools.
The humanitarian prodigies like Ana and Nick are laudable for going
beyond simple protesting to help their causes. Today=92s young social
entrepreneurs come across as more constructive than my generation of
student activists, and more savvy about how to accomplish their goals
cost-effectively.
Senator Chris Dodd has pushed for a requirement of 100 hours of public
service in high school. There=92s a risk that a mandate undermines the
virtue, but on balance I=92m in favor. Colleges should also emulate
Princeton and encourage young people to take a =93gap year=94 of public
service abroad (I list a few possibilities for a gap year and for
student activism on my blog, nytimes.com/ontheground).
Climate change has particularly galvanized high school students =97
perhaps because it=92s their world that we=92re cooking. A 16-year-old in
San Francisco, Taylor Francis, has been speaking to groups around the
country about global warming; after some training by Al Gore, he has
set up his own Web site and is heading to China in June to give a
dozen lectures there.
=93There=92s an enormous outpouring of young people who are trying to do
community service,=94 Taylor said. =93Unfortunately, a lot of that is
probably just to get into college.=94
These days, even some elementary children are getting involved. More
than 2.5 million children participated in a drive on Club Penguin, a
children=92s activities Web site, that directed $1 million to charity.
In keeping with thousands of years of tradition, I should be wringing
my hands about adolescents these days, so lazy and degenerate compared
with my own upstanding generation. But when I see high school students
working energetically to save the lives of people half a world away,
before they are even allowed to buy a beer, I=92m reduced to mumbling
admiration. These kids are truly inspiring.
As a 16-year-old in Melbourne, Fla., Allyson Brown organized a
Valentine=92s dance at her high school, with the proceeds going to fight
malaria in Africa. That dance grew into Stayin=92 Alive, a campaign that
has attracted more than 100 schools in 31 states to raise money to buy
mosquito bed nets that cost $10 each and protect a family from
malaria.
The aim of Stayin=92 Alive, which is run by a group called Malaria No
More, is to buy enough bed nets to protect two million children.
Allyson, who remains very involved in the program, will have saved
more lives as a student than many doctors save in a lifetime.
It=92s true that some of the activism may have less to do with
humanitarianism than with college applications. But even when greedy,
self-absorbed cynics take on some worthy cause for the most selfish
motives, they often learn and grow from the experience.
=93I=92ve seen some people who just want to bump up their r=E9sum=E9s,=94
Allyson acknowledged. But she said that most participation seemed
heartfelt =97 including that of a girl, about 7 years old, who ran a
lemonade stand to buy bed nets for African kids.
=93A lot of people say that teenagers aren=92t thinking about the greater
good,=94 Allyson added, just a hint of protest in her voice. =93But when
you give teens a chance to help, and they know their contributions
will make a difference, then they help a lot.=94
So maybe it=92s time that we all learn from our juniors.
I invite you to comment on this column on my blog,
www.nytimes.com/onthegrou=
nd,
and join me on Facebook at www.facebook.com/kristof.
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