An eighth-grader reflects on how a group of teens at school helped to change the world.

Three years ago, my three sisters and I were doing some spring-cleaning when we realized that we had a lot of children's videos that we had either outgrown or no longer watched. We remembered how a few years earlier, when my friend Alex had been in the hospital being treated for Leukemia, she would watch movies to pass the time. We decided to take our videos to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, the hospital where Alex had been treated.

“Look at what you've produced, Jojo the Magnifico! You've done something beautiful.”

My heart jumped upon hearing those words from Professor Zee, a professional clown. With a beaming smile, I looked around to see a dozen of my peers dressed as clowns with makeup and rainbow hair, making balloon animals—and making a difference. I saw my friends bring laughter and joy to the otherwise mundane lives of the patients we were visiting in a nursing home.