At 16 years old, Greta Thunberg gave a tearful and impassioned speech to world leaders. “How dare you?” she asked. She stood in front of the United Nations and accused these powerful people of stealing her dreams and her childhood.

Greta CARES deeply about our planet and all the creatures who call it home. She first became aware of the climate crisis at age 11, when a teacher showed a video about the critical situation to her class in school. It went straight to her heart. She had trouble eating and became extremely sad. Greta only began to feel better once her family made changes at home. They started growing their own food and installed solar panels as a way to do their part in reversing the damage of climate change.

Before her famous appearance at the U.N., she started a climate strike in her native Sweden. On the first day, she stood alone outside the Swedish Parliament holding a homemade sign. The next day someone else joined her. The day after that a few more people showed up and less than a month later thousands of people stood beside her protesting climate change. Greta has inspired thousands of young people to fight against the policies that fail to protect our planet. She organized four million people’s participation in a climate strike across the globe on September 20, 2019.

She may be small in size, but Greta has a forceful presence when speaking on a topic she CARES so deeply about. As a teenage girl, she could easily be intimidated by the powerful adults she addresses, but that’s not Greta. She never backs down and is not afraid to disagree. Her passion and perseverance have inspired thousands of other young people to take a stand and work to reverse the climate crisis.