Maybe it was in the stars that Danny Seo would become a leader in the environmental movement. Seo was born in 1977 on International Earth Day. At the ripe old age of 12, he launched the student advocacy group, Earth 2000.

Originally founded to save 66 acres of forest and wetlands, Earth 2000 is now the largest student group for animal rights in the country. Although that first battle in his home state of Pennsylvania was lost, Seo was encouraged rather than disheartened by the battle. Youth involvement, Seo says, “changes the generation.” And while national activist groups are sometimes condescending to their young members, Seo and Earth 2000 intend to empower kids and to gain more respect for youth.

Seo is a young man in constant forward motion. Since 1989, he has organized a large anti-whaling demonstration in Washington, D.C., provided vegetarian meals to people with AIDS, worked to pass a resolution to ban the capture of wild animals for classroom displays, lobbied for the passage of two major animal rights initiatives in his home state, headed an anti-fur campaign against two major clothing companies, and promoted vegetarianism for Generation X'ers. His most recent project is focusing Earth 2000 on utilizing kids' economic power to influence political and environmental decisions. The group has already persuaded four thousand retailers to sign a “Statement of Insurance” not to sell fur products.

While Seo has gained recognition and received awards, such as the Albert Schweitzer Humanities Institute Award, for his work, he finds the work itself and the opportunity to get others involved the ultimate reward. To advance the causes of Earth 2000, Seo does a lot of traveling and as many speaking engagements as possible.
          
He invests not only his time, but his own college-fund money in his projects. He's been described as a one-person army-a publicist, a speaker, and a fundraiser.

Kids are not usually educated or prepared for political and social activism; Seo believes that participation in the real world is essential. “What we lack in classrooms,” he concludes, “is giving students the freedom to learn in their own interpretative way.” Seo felt he learned more about civics and government in one day of lobbying than a month in class. Now he's putting everything he's learned into a guide book for young people that will be published in 1997.

Though his schedule is demanding, Seo is ever ready to take on more. Other kids ask him all the time how he does it, and he simply tells them his own story. The message, he says, is clear: “If I can do it as an average kid, so can you....”