You’ve heard of Greta Thunberg, Emma Gonzalez and David Hogg … but there are many other teen activists you may have never heard of.
Jack Andraka
When a friend of Andraka’s passed away from pancreatic cancer, he decided to take upon himself the task of finding a detection method for it. His method can predict pancreatic cancer with over 90% accuracy and is faster and cheaper than the preexisting methods.
Mari Copeny
Also known as “Little Miss Flint”, Copeny raises awareness for the Flint, Michigan water crisis. Flint has not had clean water since 2014. When she was just eight years old, Mari wrote a letter to then-President Barack Obama asking for him to pay more attention to the crisis. He did, and in turn, granted $100 million to help fix the crisis. She continues to raise money for the cause and others, focusing on helping underprivileged youth in her hometown. She is currently only 12 years old and still making significant waves with her activism.
Jazz Jennings
One of the more famous teen activists of her time, Jazz Jennings advocates for transgender rights and raises money to help trans teens through the foundation she co-founded with her parents, the TransKids Purple Rainbow Foundation. She has a YouTube channel and starred in a TLC show about her life, so she has been a very outspoken member of the trans community for a while now. Her parents say that she has identified as female since she was first able to speak and has consistently been one of the youngest transgender people to be in the public eye.
Zach Bonner
Zach Bonner is an advocate for the homeless youth of America. When he was only six years old, he began his philanthropy by collecting water bottles for the victims of Hurricane Charley. He established the Little Red Wagon Foundation, and through it has helped raise money and collect school supplies and toys for over 10,000 homeless children. He has completed two incredibly long walking journeys, one from his home to the White House (1,225 miles), and the other across America ( 2,478 miles), in order to raise awareness and money. He has completed several projects in the name of ending childhood homelessness and has won several awards for his service to the community. According to Wikipedia, he now works at Apple Inc.
Zoe Rosenberg
Rosenberg is an animal rights activist who focuses specifically on farm animals and has founded a sanctuary for mistreated farm animals in California. She has been arrested publicly on live television and on Facebook live stream several times while protesting the mistreatment and slaughter of animals in various locations and in relation to various organizations. She has chained herself up, superglued her hands to things and rushed sports fields in the name of animal justice. She has also received several awards for her bold displays of activism and efforts to help the animal community.
