Meet the teen who is starting a movement to make a difference

Allyson Vanek is getting teens across the country to commit themselves to others.

Allyson Vanek is, in many ways, a normal 16-year-old. She attends Benet Academy in Lyle, Ill., where she is a member of the varsity tennis team and the environmental club. She attends Notre Dame Church in Clarindin Hills with her family, is in National Honors Society and is currently focused on scoring well in her ACTs. Vanek is also a published author.

She recently published “Why Not Me: Young People Making a Difference in the World.” This venture began after watching an episode of 60 Minutes on television which featured the foundation Free the Children.

Free the Children was started by Craig Kielburger of Toronto. Kielburger stared the foundation at age 12, inspired by opening the newspaper and reading the story of young Iqbal Masih. Masih was born in 1983 in Pakistan. Sold into illegal slavery at age 4, he spent six years chained to a carpet-weaving loom. Masih escaped at age 10 and spent the next two years helping more than 3,000 Pakistani children in bonded labor escape to freedom, and made speeches about child labor throughout the world. He also captured the world’s attention by speaking out for children’s rights.

Kielburger read the story of this remarkable young man, which ends on an unfortunate note.

Masih was assassinated on April 12, 1995, in Muridke. Kielburger founded the organization to raise awareness in North America about child labor and to encourage other children to get involved in the issue.[8] In an attempt to learn more about child labor, Kielburger then travelled to South Asia to meet child laborers and hear their stories first-hand.

Vanek, inspired by the story of one young person helping others, decided she also wanted to help others by writing about other organization started by young people.

“I thought I could spread the message of all these stories of these children who help others every day.”

Vanek wasted no time starting her project. She researched several organizations via the Internet, and then began reaching out to the organizations to set up interviews.

Her father, Joe Vanek, helped confirm the information and let the organizational leaders and their parents or guardians know about the book.

People responded positively to the idea.

“Because these foundations were started by kids, they understand what I am trying to do,” Allyson said.

Vanek wrote the stories of 18 foundations, all started by children. Several of them, such as the Ladybug Foundation, tell the unique stories of traditional kid’s fundraising methods.

The Ladybug Foundation is started. By a 5 year old.

Hannah Taylor, at age 5, saw a homeless man eating from a garbage can on a winter day. After thinking about that man several nights in a row, she asked herself “If everyone shared what they had, could that cure homelessness?” That led to Hannah starting The Ladybug Foundation.

The original Ladybug Foundation used bake sales and art sales to fund projects, but it did not take long for Taylor to realize she wanted to help further. She organized “Big Bosses” lunches with top business leaders.

Those business leaders gave her advice and encouraged her project. Three years later, in 2004, Taylor started The Ladybug Foundation, Inc., a charity dedicated to raising money for the needs of homeless people. She become a face for the homeless, speaking out at engagements across Canada, and elsewhere in the world, from one person to groups as large as 16,000. To date, Hannah has spoken to more than 175 schools, organizations and events, and donated more than $2 million both directly and indirectly.

She also founded a separate charity, The Ladybug Foundation Education Program Inc., through which she has inspired the development of “make Change: The Ladybug Foundation Education Program”, a K-12 resource for use in schools across Canada to empower young people to get involved and “make Change” in their world.

During the course of the next year, Vanek wrote as time allowed, between tennis and school.

She was grateful to have the support of her family in this venture.

“My advice to others would be to get the help of an adult, but have it be your idea and your passion,” Vanek said. “Make sure you have the passion to do it and follow through with it.”

She certainly followed through with her idea. As she finished writing, her father had an idea of where to turn for publication.

“My dad had some connections with Simple Truth,” she said.

“I’ve known Joe since childhood and one day, over lunch, he mentioned that Allyson had written a book about young people making a difference in the world,” said Mac Anderson, publisher of Simple Truths, a division of Sourcebooks, Inc. of Naperville, Ill.

“I loved the idea and asked her to submit a few of her stories. After reading them, I realized this subject and content would make a great Simple Truths book, so we decided to move forward and publish it.”

The book’s title itself was a simple truth.

“I heard all these kids’ stories, and I thought, ‘Why not me?’,” Vanek said.

Simple Truths publishes gift-size books, featuring full-color pages and an easy-to-read format.“The way that they set up the book is a good idea because it’s like short stories,” Vanek said. “There actually has been more publicity than I expected. I expected it to not get out as much as it has, which like really helps with donating other money to charity.”

Giving money to charity is not only the theme of the book, but is also a personal goal for Vanek. Through church, she has worked with the agency Providing Advocacy, Dignity, andShelter, (PADS), and Feed My Starving Children. She traveled to Charleston on a mission trip and helped at a food bank for a week. With the publication of this book, she’s pleased to be able to help by giving money.

“First royalty check …was around $2,000,” said Vanek. “I gave to Free the Children and I gave to Alex’s Lemonade Stand. These were the ones who put the most interest into the book, they deserved the first check.”

Through the royalty checks she hopes to give money to all the charities featured in this book.

“I just hope it inspires children younger than me or my age to get out there and do stuff to help better society instead of sitting around looking at stuff on their phones all day.”

We’re confident it will.

This story originally appeared in Destra Magazine.