Two PA students win national award for organizing volunteer activities in hometowns

Ryan Morgan, 16, of Moscow, near Scranton, and Kennedy Jet Kulish, 12, of Lancaster were this year’s winners from Pennsylvania of the 2009 Prudential Spirit of Community Awards, which recognize 100 youth from across the country who organize exceptional volunteer efforts for their communities. Each of the winners of the program, which is sponsored by Prudential and the National Association of Secondary School Principals received engraved silver medallions, $1,000 awards and an all expenses paid 4-day trip with their families to the 14th annual award ceremony and dinner reception at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History.

Ryan, a junior at North Pocono High School, promoted the use of energy-efficient light bulbs in his community by giving away 1,000 compact fluorescent bulbs while drawing inspiration from Nobel Peace Prize winner Al Gore on ways to reduce global warming and grassroots activists at a Farm Aid concert.

“I was inspired to do my part to end global warming,” he says. “I realized even a teenager really can have an impact on the world community.”

Raising money from celebrities, businesses, and raffles, he distributed more than 2,000 CFL light bulbs as part of conservation-education effort that touched his school and community and started a website to spread the word about compact fluorescents.

Kennedy Jet, a sixth-grader at Hambright Elementary School, recruited family, friends, classmates, Girl Scouts, and others to raise nearly $75,000 for children with heart defects, as part of “Kisses for Kaeden” a project named after her baby brother, who was born with a heart defect, to benefit Penn State Children’s Hospital.

“No matter how young you are,” she says, “if you want to help another, you can do anything you put your mind to.”

Source: Prudential Spirit of Community Awards
Writer: Joseph Plummer