You know you're awesome…so why not share that awesome with us? We're looking for bright, committed, and enthusiastic teens from across the nation to join our Youth Leadership Team (YLT). From February 19 through May 15, we are accepting applications for the 2015-2016 YLT. Wanna know more?

I think the phrase "changed my life" gets thrown around too much. It takes a lot to turn a life around, something huge. In the past 18 months, my life has made a complete 180. I've gone from a slump to a peak faster than anyone else I know. Here's five moments from my Youth Leadership Team experience and how they changed my life. 

Before flying to Washington D.C., I had never been on a plane or flew anywhere. I was terrified and didn’t know what to expect. To top it off, I had to fly by myself. Then to think I am going somewhere that I would be with other teens that I didn’t even know made my nerves even worse.

I have been on the Youth Leadership Team for almost two years now, and I have done so many things it’s hard to pick a top five. For those of you who don’t know what the YLT is, it’s essentially a group of teenagers from around the country (literally) who meet and represent The National Campaign. Throughout this wonderful experience, these are the five moments that changed my life:

I hate picking the “best” or “worst” of something. It is always such a struggle for me to narrow down moments, lists, or what to pack for even a weekend trip. It is especially hard when I am choosing from things so positive and beneficial as my experiences on Youth Leadership Team (YLT).

You know you're awesome…so why not share that awesome with us? We're looking for bright, committed, and enthusiastic teens from across the nation to join our Youth Leadership Team (YLT). From February 14 through May 14, we are accepting applications for the 2013-2014 YLT. Wanna know more?

Helping record ads for Stay Teen was harder than I expected it to be. I grabbed the camera and I had no idea what to do. I had to stop and think about what teenagers do for fun nowadays, not including texting, tweeting, Tumblr, or Instagram. My mind was blank and I realized that teens are so focused on what others think about them that they forget about what they like. Teens care more about what they are seen as then what they really are. They put on a mask to fit in, and post it everywhere and try to grab attention, which is understandable because everyone wants to fit in. But there is more to life than just looking good for pictures on Facebook, if we aren’t doing something to look good, it isn’t fun or interesting to do.

Members of the Youth Leadership Teamvisit Washington, DC three times a year.  On their second visit, they attend meetings on Capitol Hill to meet with their Congresspeople and to educate them about teen pregnancy prevention.  This is Makeda’s story of her visit to the Hill.  The next Youth Leadership Team class will be recruited starting in February 2013; keep checking StayTeen.org for more info!

For all of you that haven’t been to Washington, DC, the home of our federal government and pretty much any “National Museum of ____” you could think of, it’s an awesome city.  Recently, I traveled there for the second of my Youth Leadership Team meetings, and I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to go to Capitol Hill and meet with Congressman Ackerman (D-NY) and Senator Schumer (D-NY), as well as their staff.  

It is not everyday we as teenagers get to rub elbows with the policymakers and leaders of our country. It is not everyday we as constituents get to call on the people who represent our interests and beliefs and tell them what is important to us. And it is not everyday we get to be a voice for teens all across the country and drink toasted marshmallow milkshakes in the same hour. As a member of the YLT, I got to do all of those things when I visited Capitol Hill last month to ask my congressmen to invest in evidence-based teen pregnancy prevention programs for the next fiscal year. On that day, I spoke to three staff assistants and one Representative about why teen pregnancy prevention is important to me and why it is should be important to them as well.