These kids are more than all right
By In-Sung Yoo, USA TODAY
Good things can come from the very young. Consider:
Makenzie Snyder, just 12, was troubled to see foster children moving from new home to new home, with belongings in trash bags. She launched Children to Children to provide foster kids duffel bags, books and teddy bears. She's donated more than 28,000 gift bags to date.
Anthony Leanna, 12, upset when his grandmother lost her hair to cancer treatment, started Heavenly Hats, which provides hats to cancer patients. He now partners with the National Football League and S.C. Johnson.
These two are among the 13 winners of the 16th annual National Caring Award, being given Monday in Washington, D.C., for extraordinary contributions to humane causes.
The awards are presented by the non-profit Caring Institute, founded in 1985 by former congressional investigator Val Halamandaris after an encounter with Mother Teresa.
"She told me that there was a poverty of the spirit in the U.S. that was far worse than the poverty of the body in India and Africa," he recalls. "And with a finger in my ribs, she said, 'Do something about it' ... It was not a suggestion, it was an order."
Young adult winners receive a $2,000 scholarship. This year's winners:
