This is a guest post by Alexa Boghosian, 16, Founder and president of The GreenTeens and student at Malborough High School in LA

The summer of my freshman year of high school, I volunteered as a docent at “Cool Globes,” an environmental exhibit at the California Science Center, where I provided tours and engaged students on field trips from the surrounding public elementary schools. By the end of the summer, I noticed that the majority of kids who visited the exhibit had difficulty answering some what I thought to be basic questions like, “Why is recycling good for the environment?” After witnessing the need for environmental literacy in my community first hand, I decided to create The GreenTeens a four-day after-school program serving public elementary schools to increase students’ understanding, inspire them to take action, and empower them to lead their communities toward green citizenship.

I recruited 12 passionate classmates from Marlborough School, and together we went through a six month planning process in which we developed a completely original curriculum created and taught by students, for students. Meanwhile, we applied for and won a $2,500 grant from ACE to fund the project for three years. This grant was one of the most crucial part of jump-starting our project. Without the money necessary to buy supplies, The GreenTeens would not be able to provide environmental education free of charge to schools in need.

After receiving the ACE grant in the spring of 2010, GreenTeens was able to start visiting local elementary schools last fall. In the 2010-2011 school year, GreenTeens visited five public elementary schools and taught over 120 students in Los Angeles, graduating them as “GreenTweens” and empowering each of them to become green ambassadors in their own communities. We also received a match grant from the U.S. Green Building Council to be able to serve more schools. In addition, GreenTeens was recently recognized on a national level by the White House administration in President Obama’s

This year we are looking forward to visiting more elementary schools and expanding the volunteer aspect of GreenTeens to other high schools through branches. It is amazing how much GreenTeens has accomplished over the past two years and how many more opportunities lie ahead for us thanks to the ACE grant that put our concept into action!