Grade 7 students took part in a video chat with Amy Ziede this week to learn about her company, and how it all began when she was 12 years old.

Her organization, Creating Connected Communities started as part of her bat mitzvah project and was called Amy’s Holiday Party with a budget of only $400 to help underprivileged youth celebrate the holidays in December. The idea came to her after hearing a story of gifts being stolen from a youth shelter just before Christmas.

She chose to be an agent of change and her company today now engages over 800 volunteers and helps over 5000 underprivileged kids in Atlanta with a budget of over $650 000. The company trains Jewish teenagers to help communities in Atlanta with homelessness, foster care, refugees, and children living in poverty.

Students learned about Amy’s failures along the way, how she needed to come up with strategic plans to overcome these obstacles along the way to keep the company going and growing. The company had to start from scratch and start over 4 times before becoming the thriving, independent non-profit company it is today.

For more information or donate to Amy’s company, please visit her website