In many respects, Marla Ruzicka is a normal, happy teenager. From a nice, conservative family in a small, conservative town in California, she's a good athlete, an A student, and president of the student body. Still, like most teens, she's discontent with the status quo, concerned about the state of the world, and has often felt disempowered. But Marla Ruzicka does something about it.

When she read about the depletion of the rainforest and the abuse of its indigenous cultures, she organized and petitioned the school's opposing administration to bring a speaker from Greenpeace on Earth Day. With money she saved from her paper route, she traveled with Volunteers for Peace to Ecuador to plant trees. Next, she raised money to join a human rights delegation to Guatemala and provided aid to a refugee camp there. In 1995, despite warnings that she could face heavy fines and up to ten years in prison, Ruzicka and fifty other youths formed a Friendship Delegation and made a trip for peace into Cuba.

Her involvement in issues of peace and justice began in the eighth grade, when Ruzicka organized a student walkout in protest of the impending Gulf War. Over 200 students participated and the local media covered the event.

"We learned that we could move others to take action...," she says. "Even though we couldn't stop the war, I discovered that I could be involved in the movement for peace and justice. From that day on I knew that I was going to be committed to working for change...."

In addition to the very real risks in traveling to volatile zones in foreign countries, Ruzicka has encountered opposition and reprimands in her own country for her political and social activism. Her high school principal once advised her that "a good leader does not try to make change; a good leader does what they are supposed to so that others will follow their example." But Ruzicka's resolve, commitment and enthusiasm are unflagging, as she prefers to live by the example and words of Mahatma Gandhi: "Inaction in a time of conflict is inexcusable."

Currently, Ruzicka is again busy raising funds, this time to publish the book she's written on how young people can get involved in social activism. Her dream is to distribute the guide free to high schools. She believes education is key to youth involvement in such crucial issues as social justice, poverty, environmental and human rights. "Youth are always being targeted as bad," says Ruzicka, but the fact is that too many young people are simply "mainstreamed," poorly informed. "Education is critical for people to become compassionate," she says. "If you don't know the problem and you don't know the reality, how can you help?"

Go to the website below to learn more about the work Marla was doing.

For the story of Marla Ruzicka's work as an adult, just Google her name and read the grieving stories of the reporters who knew her.