2026 High School Winners

Kaitlyn Zhang is a 12th grader at the Country Day School in Ontario, Canada. She decided to create a video for the contest after her environmental science teacher, Ms. Loukes, told her about it and she became more interested in the impacts of fast fashion. Kaitlyn was particularly surprised that more than 80% of textiles end up in landfills every year and that women, who are the primary workers in fast-fashion manufacturing, earn as little as $3.00 a day to produce clothing. “Everyone wears clothes, everyone shops, but a lot of people are not aware of the implications that result when purchasing fast fashion clothing,” she shared.  

To make her video, Kaitlyn created all the animations, recorded all her voiceovers, and edited it in Canva. She found it challenging to create the animations and pare her script to one minute, but she made sure to select the most important statistics and form a simple call to action. After the contest, Kaitlyn expressed that she “wants to continue raising corporate accountability by joining an advocacy team or student organizations that focus on sustainable purchasing and supply chain transparency.”  

In the fall, Kaitlyn will be starting her first year at Yale University, where she plans to major in computer science and economics. She hopes to join more environmentally focused student clubs and volunteer with Dwight Hall, a student group centered around social justice and community service. Kaitlyn is part of her high school robotics club, in which her and her team competed in the FRC World Championships and won the Ontario Provincial and World Divisional championships. She also plays the piano and flute, and used to compete in horseback riding. Kaitlyn was recently selected as one of the eight riders, out of 100, to show in Canada’s Rural Agricultural Winter Fair.