10 Teen Leaders Worth Celebrating This Black History Month
- 1. Amandla Stenberg Most people recognize Amandla Stenberg from her role in The Hunger Games, but she’s also a vocal activist, using her celebrity to draw attention to issues like cultural appropriation, police brutality, LGBTQ rights, and racism. Her video, “Don’t Cash Crop On My Corn Rows”, which has been viewed over 2 million times, in many ways sparked the present conversation around cultural appropriation, especially in Hollywood. No big deal, though, it was a project for her high school history class.
- 2. Skai Jackson Skai Jackson is a fourteen-year-old anti-bullying advocate, Disney Channel star, Twitter clap-back specialist, and, very briefly, celebrated meme. Today, she’s balancing school and her acting career, and working with No Kid Hungry, an organization dedicated to ending childhood hunger, to empower and support those who need it most.
- 3. Marley Dias At the age of 11, Marley Dias created a book drive, #1000BlackGirlBooks, with the goal of ensuring more young black girls saw themselves represented in literature. Her story went viral, and she was able to collect over 8,000 books about women and girls of color t donate to young girls. On the back of the successful book drive, she became an editor at Elle Magazine, and today has a new book, forthcoming from Scholastic, showing kids and teens how to get involved in activism, social justice, volunteerism, and promoting social good. With the platform and influence Marley has built, she’s made it her goal to help other kids realize that if they see a problem, they can be the ones to change it. It’s never “too early” and you’re never “too young” to change the world for better.
- 4. Mikaila Ulmer Mikaila Ulmer is the 12-year-old founder and CEO of Me and The Bees Lemonade, a wildly successful lemonade business (just last year, she signed an 11 million dollar deal with Whole Foods!) with an eco-conscious, philanthropic mission. Each batch of lemonade uses locally-sourced honey to support beekeepers, and a portion of all profits go to organizations dedicated to saving honeybees from extinction. Ulmer started small, with an idea for a lemonade business that would support and raise awareness about the critical role bees play in the well-being of our environment, and a recipe for Flaxseed Lemonade from her great-grandmother. From there, it took hard work: she entered her product into youth entrepreneurial events, contests, and business fairs. Eventually, she hustled her way onto Whole Foods shelves, and an appearance on Shark Tank, where she scored a deal for $60,000. Her business took off, but Mikaila never stopped working for good. Today, she’s working inspire other young entrepreneurs to pursue their dreams. Just last year, she gave a speech on young women in business at Michelle Obama’s #StateOfWomen Summit.
- 5. Yara Shahidi Best known for playing Zoey Johnson on the hit ABC sitcom Black-ish, Shahidi began her career in television at the age of six, starred in Imagine That alongside Eddie Murphy at the age of nine, and began her role on Black-ish as a 14-year-old. She’s 17 now, and on top of being an award-winning actress, she is also a passionate activist. Shahidi has been a powerful voice in advocating diversity and representation of minorities in media. She’s given speeches on the subject (http://www.teenvogue.com/story/yara-shahidi-representation- diversity-hollywood-activism-art), and recently sat down with civil rights leader and Georgia congressman John Lewis to talk about the power and importance of young black activists (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/john-lewis-yara-shahidi-praise-the-power-of-young-black- activists_us_57acab11e4b0ba7ed23f54f7).
- 6. Lil C-note Lil C-note is a 10-year-old rapper from Jackson, Mississippi who got his start tagging along with his dad on trips to the studio. He made his first song at six years old, and since then, he’s been selling CD’s independently with his dad, slowly accumulating accolades and endorsements from big-name artists like Cash Money Records CEO Birdman and Atlanta rapper Young Thug. He’s now sold over 250,000 CD’s and is making “more than six figures a year”, but he isn’t in it for the money. C-note’s goal is to uplift his community, “I want to show other kids that anything is possible, anything is possible at any age. I just want to be a role model.” Recently, he raised $10,000 for a toy drive to give back to a local elementary school in his impoverished Jackson neighborhood.
- 7. Berneisha Hooker Berneisha Hooker is a nineteen-year-old activist and artist from New Orleans. Berneisha’s neighborhood was devastated by hurricane Katrina, but she never let it discourage her. Her resilience was an inspiration to her fellow classmates and her community, who rallied around her and the plays she wrote. Berneisha’s plays reflect her drive to strengthen student’s voices and shatter negative, racist stereotypes. Her story is the subject of episode four of the ESSENCE docuseries “Black Girl Magic”, which you can watch it here.
- 8. Haile Thomas At 17-years-old, Haile Thomas is a vegan chef, youth health activist, international motivational speaker, cookbook author, and founder of her own youth health initiative, Healthy Active Positive Purposeful Youth (HAPPY). Through HAPPY, Thomas has become a strong voice in the conversation around student health and diet in America, and the fight against issues like childhood obesity, heart disease, and diabetes in youth. She’s also met Michelle Obama six times, but who’s counting.
- 9. Robby Novak 12-year-old Robby Novak has made waves giving pep-talks and motivational speeches as the “Kid President.” As Kid President, Robby shares fun, easy ways for young people to make their voices heard, inspire others, and “make the world a little more awesome.” He’s an inspiration both for what he’s done, and what he has overcome—Novak is a lifelong sufferer of osteoporosis, or “brittle bones disease”, and has had over 80 bones break in his lifetime. His videos, viewable on SoulPancake and their YouTube channel, have been watched over 100 million times. He’s also a New York Times best-seller for his book, Kid President’s Guide to Being Awesome, AND he's interviewed Beyoncé. Check out his YouTube videos here.
- 10. Zuriel Oduwole At 14 years old, Zuriel Oduwole already has four documentaries under her belt. Her career in filmmaking began when she entered her a school documentary-making competition with a film about the Ghana revolution. From there, she taught herself how write, edit, and produce full-length documentaries. Now, her fourth film, “A Promising Africa” is showing on the silver screen in five different countries. She’s been featured in Forbes (the youngest person ever to receive a Forbes feature at age 10 in 2013), and in Forbes Afrique’s “100 Most Influential Women” list alongside 2 female presidents.