Lily the Bernese Mountain dog is very proud of all of her heroes.  These kids are really something - they are very active in their community and have learned the importance of giving.  You can be one of Lily's Heroes too!  Want to learn more or need some ideas?  Click on "Become a Hero".  Is one of your pals doing something really cool that helps people?  Check out "Nominate a Kid".

Lily hopes that kids (and parents) will be inspired by these stories.  Many of these ideas can be copied and carried out right in your own neighborhood.  If you appear on our website in this section, you will be entitled to a free certificate.

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Alana Ethridge, a 12-year-old student, actress and philanthropist, is best known from season one of "Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader." What makes her a Hero is that she has taken her celebrity and created a foundation called Alana’s Achievers, to help young kids between the ages of 4 and 16 develop positive goals in life and more importantly, help them work towards achieving their dreams.

Alana's Achievers focuses on the importance of a good education and healthy lifestyle by promoting the benefits of a solid education, healthy eating habits and an active life that includes fitness. Kids will be rewarded for keeping their grades up, having perfect attendance, and good citizenship. Alana speaks from the heart when she shares the importance of Alana’s Achievers with others, “Whatever is in our power to make their journey a little bit easier, whether it monetary or mentorship we hope to play a big part in their road to their personal stardom. I have been very fortunate to be able to pursue my dream to be an actress, my career has provided me the opportunity to have been cast a hit TV show, and meet many famous people, gone to really cool events, and given back to my community. None of this would have ever been possible without the support and love from my family and friends.”

County: San Diego CA, USA 

School: Unspecified

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After learning about the human rights violations that were happening to girls in Afghanistan, Alaina Podmorow decided to make a difference. Alaina, nine years old at the time, started an organization called Little Women for Little Women in Afghanistan. Since then, she has been fundraising to educate Afghan girls. Alaina's dream was to band together with other youth to raise awareness and raise money. Today Little Women have raised over $100,000 and are busy spreading the word that education=peace.

City: Winfield BC, Canada 

School: Unspecified

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Addison has actively helped us foster greyhounds for the past two years. Through his participation he has learned many important life lessons in compassion, patience, boundaries and care taking. He has also learned how to let go of the foster dogs knowing this is the ultimate goal – to help them find forever homes. All of these lessons have helped him become a wonderful handler with Wags for Hope, which is a local pet therapy organization.

County: Frederick MD, USA 

School: Deer Crossing Elementary

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In August 2008, Miranda Lynch and her father went on a vacation to South Africa and decided to spend a week volunteering in a small rural Zulu village, iNzinga. It was very intense, and on the first night Miranda asked to leave. We didn't leave, and by the last night, she asked that we never really leave; that we return regularly and work to help solve the problems there that cause chronic poverty. Within a couple months, Miranda co-founded Isipho with me, her father. Our time living and working there helped us realize we could help end malnutrition by teaching the people of iNzinga how to grow their own food and provide them with the fencing, tools and seeds needed to start. And we could help end illiteracy by providing adequate books and teacher training.

She has helped define the programs Isipho offers, formed a group at school to raise funds, spoken at events, negotiated meetings with leaders of CARE and other organizations we can partner with. Her work has been tireless. We will return in August 2009 to bring books, plant community gardens, and plant the first of many family gardens.

County: DeKalb GA, USA 

School: Unspecified

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When Chloe Maxmin began high school, she was surprised to find that there was little awareness of environmental issues or how students could make a difference on the climate crisis. That’s when she began to formulate her life’s mission: to make global warming the defining issue of her generation. Her goals were to 1) educate and create opportunities for direct action, and 2) help students and community members realize that they could make a difference and see the results of their efforts echo worldwide.

By the start of her sophomore year, she had founded the Climate Action Club at her school. It was aimed at educating and mobilizing action to fight global warming within the school and community. Chloe works tirelessly at this endeavor-- in addition to five AP courses, Mandarin Chinese, varsity sports, piano studies, and a perfect GPA! The Club has a growing list of accomplishments: a comprehensive NO IDLE policy that has changed behavior on campus; recycling over 4000 batteries from students and now expanding into town; a printer cartridge recycling campaign that educates students about the negative effects of cartridges, circulates receptacles, and delivers cartridges to a recycling center. The club has led seminars for faculty and administrators to share information on energy conservation, installed energy optimization software on school computers, and is working on a variety of approaches to reduce the school’s carbon footprint.

County: Lincoln ME, USA 

School: Lincoln Academy

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Casey Landahl is a 5-year-old girl who loves to help and care for others. This past year Casey has been planning her Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle birthday party. She decided to ask for donations in place of gifts. Casey loves animals and has a friend at her veterinarian's office who runs a non-for-profit organization called Pets-4-Pets. They are a no-kill pet rescue group. Casey asked me last year how she could "help the cats". We talked about it and since our house is "full" (three and cats and two giant dogs), we decided that maybe we could raise money for them. Casey had her party at the local martial arts center where they allowed us to have Pets-4-Pets and their spokes-cat, "Merlot" attend. The martial arts center asked for donations in Casey's name as well.

County: Frederick MD, USA 

School:

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Mark Rinkel first sold $17,000 in lemonade to purchase a diabetic alert service dog for his brother. After the company turned out to be a scam, Mark started Red Alert Dogs for Diabetics to establish industry wide standards and to help credible trainers and families. His charity has helped purchase puppies, pay vet bills, and training costs for 15 families around the country and in Canada. He has also partnered with researchers to study the dogs and to someday develop a breath test for blood sugar instead of a blood test. Before getting a service dog, one 7 year old girl spent 2 weeks in pediatric intensive care when her blood sugar dropped low. She wasn't expected to survive, but somehow she pulled out of the coma. The medical bills surpassed a quarter of a million dollars. In the 8 months since she has received the service dog Mark purchased for her she hasn't had a seizure or serious blood sugar drop. Dogs do save lives. Mark has also educated more than 1 million people from 40 different countries on the differences between type 1 and type 2 diabetes and the warning signs. If you don't know the warning signs, you should check out Mark's web site

See Mark on the local news.

County: Arapahoe CO, USA 

School: Challenge School

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John Sun is a happy and healthy 9 year old who loves animals and hopes to a veterinarian one day. John has dedicated a great deal of time and effort to raising money and awareness for premature births. To date, John has collected more than 173 lbs. of aluminum cans from his community in order to purchase 50 Boyds Bears miniature stuffed animals for the NICU unit at Shady Grove Adventist Hospital. He has delivered 143 gift bags to families of preemies at Shady Grove Adventist Hospital and Frederick Memorial Hospital and served as the honorary NICU Santa at Shady Grove Adventist Hospital this past Christmas. His passion for animals, big and small, led him to Small Angels Rescue, a non-profit organization dedicated to rescuing and finding loving homes for small animals including, chinchillas, degus, gerbils, guinea pigs, hamsters, and mice. To date he has raised $425.00 in donations for this organization.

County: Frederick MD, USA 

School: Urbana Elementary

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In April 2008, Evan Frank learned from his children's church teacher about children dying all over the world due to water bourne diseases. Every 8 seconds a person dies from water related diseases. He rose to the challenge and has made providing clean drinking water "his life's mission". Evan began his quest to change the world by doing something he loves - baking brownies and accepting donations for them. He's been quite creative in his fundraising. He's performed a series of odd jobs, trick-or-treated for well donations, and continues to bake his brownies.

County: Jefferson WV, USA 

School: Country Day School

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Kyle and Brady Baldwin started My Own Book, an organization that spreads the joy of reading nationally by having teen volunteers visit less fortunate K-3rd grade classrooms, read a story aloud, tell about the public library, and then let the children pick a brand new book of their very own. Bookplates with the child's name are added to each book. The kids love having a book of their very own, and often it is their very first book. So far, over 17,000 books have been distributed.

County: Solano CA, USA 

School: Bryant University/Armijo High School

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Kennedy Kulish started her self initiated service project of "Kisses for Kaeden" in November of 2003 on behalf of her baby brother Kaeden who was born with several heart defects and needing several open heart surgeries before his 1st birthday. Kennedy (who was only 6 at the time) wanted to make a difference in helping other "Kaeden's" and their families. Recruiting friends, classmates and team mates Kennedy held a fundraiser for Kaeden's first birthday celebration asking family and friends to bring monetary donations for the hospital that helped Kaeden instead of normal birthday gifts for the already "spoiled" lil Kaeden. Raising over $2000.00, Kennedy was inspired to do more...much more...

County: Lancaster PA, USA 

School: Hambright Elementary

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After seeing an article in the Frederick News Post on October 14th regarding an increased need at the local food bank Matthew (11), Maeve (8), William (3), and Jade (1) McKay put a box in their red wagon and went door to door asking their neighbors for food donations. They refer to their efforts as the “Red Wagon Food Project.” They collected three large boxes of canned and box foods that they will bring to the food bank on All Saints Street in downtown Frederick. The experience was so motivating that they have decided to continue to collect food on a regular basis for donating at the food bank!

County: Frederick MD, USA 

School: West Frederick Middle, Parkway Elementary, Frederick Country Day

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Ryan Hreljac is a compelling and passionate voice for those impacted by the water crisis in the developing world. He continues to be a role model with a clear message – that every person on the planet deserves clean water, and one voice (the power of one) can make a huge difference.

In 1998, when Ryan was in grade one he learned from his teacher, Mrs Prest that people were dying because they didn't have clean water to drink. He decided that raising money for people who didn't have clean water would be a good thing. He worked for four months in order to earn his first $70. Ryan’s first well was built in 1999 at a school in a Ugandan village when Ryan was seven years-old. The well continues to serve thousands of people. Ryan’s determination grew from the $70 collected by doing simple household chores to a Foundation that today has contributed a total of 461 wells in 16 countries bringing clean water and sanitation services to over 599,081 people. The Foundation has raised millions of dollars.

City: North Grenville ON, Canada 

School: Unspecified

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Finn Case, from Alberta, Canada, learned about water poverty and its impacts in the developing world at a very young age. He was so touched by the hardships faced by others, that a kindergarten project in 2006 on ‘wheels, pulleys and levers’ set his mind in motion. Deciding to construct a kinetic well, Finn realized that if placed in the classroom, he could ask for coin donations to be placed in the well’s bucket before being lowered to make a wish. The proceeds would then go toward a real well somewhere there was a need.

City: Edmonton AB, Canada 

School: Garneau Elementary

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Joey Athey has been baking cookies each Christmas season since he was in kindergarden and selling the cookies for $1.00 a bag. He then takes the money he raises and buys toys for children in the community that are less fortunate. This started as a school project where the students were asked to give a free gift to someone and then tell their teacher what their gift was. Joey wanted to give toys to less fortunate children but could not use his own money for the toys since it was to be a "free" gift. He decided to raise money from the sale of Christmas cookies. This will be Joey's 6th year of selling cookies and he has donated over $2,000 in toys to the Middletown Valley People Helping People organization. Joey is making the world a better place one cookie at a time.

County: Frederick MD, USA 

School: Middletown Elementary School

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