Melissa Poe was 9 years old when she began a campaign for a cleaner environment by writing a letter to the then President Bush. Through her on efforts, her letter was reproduced on over 250 donated billboards (广告牌)across the country.

The response to her request for help was so huge that Poe established Kids For A Cleaner Environment (Kids F.A.C.E.) in 1989. There are now 300,000 members of Kids F.A.C.E. worldwide and it is the world’s largest youth environmental organization.

Poe has also asked the National Park Service to carry out a “Children’s Forest” project in every national park. In 1992, she was invited one of only six children in the world to speak at the Earth Summit in Brazil as part of the Voices of the future Program. In 1993, she was given a Caring Award for her efforts by the Caring Institute.

Since the organization started, Kids F.A.C.E. members have distributed and planted over 1 million trees! Ongoing tree-planting projects include Kids’ Yards — the creation of backyard wildlife habitats (栖息地) and now Kids F.A.C.E. is involved in the exciting Odyssey, which is a great way to start helping.

“We try to tell kids that it’s not OK to be lazy,” she explains, “You need to start being a response, environmentally friendly person now, right now, before you become a resource-sucking adult.”