Hundreds of passionate, teens flood the ballroom at Hilton Anaheim while pop music blasts from speakers. Members from their local school’s Friday Night Live Program (FNL) from more than 50 different counties all over the state- with some chapters traveling more than 12 hours- pour into the room, trading stickers and ambitions for change.
According to their website, “FNL’s goal is to build partnerships for positive and healthy youth development which engages youth as active leaders and resources in their communities. FNL is a youth-adult partnership that supports a lifestyle free of alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs.”
This event, known as the Friday Night Live Youth Summit, calls together youth from all over the state to learn from
keynote speakers, participate in workshops, and collaborate with others.
“There’s a lot of kids out there that really need help, but there’s not a lot of people advocating. I want to be one of those people,” Joel Ruiz (Kern County) said.
Ruiz is a member of the California Youth Council (CYC). The CYC is an elite group of individuals elevated from their own local chapters to work with FNL’s Partnership to help organize and plan the summit.
“We have summit because education is the most powerful tool and nobody can ever take that away. Educate the community. That’s how you change the world,” Ruiz said.
One part of the learning students participated in at the summit was listening to multiple speakers share their own stories. Hannah Alper, a 20-year-old environmental activist, Ashanti Branch, founder of the Ever Forward Club, and famous Tiktoker, Vic Blends, highlighted the conference.
Charlotte Solis (’26) was touched by Alper’s message and her equation for change.
“You need an issue, something that you want to help, something that you’re passionate about. [Then] you need a gift, something you are good at. So, using those two components, you can make change.” Solis says.
After Alper’s speech and other inspiring messages, club members file out to go to their chosen workshops, following topics such as mental health, cannabis use, traffic safety, fentanyl, and merchant education. The workshops use interactive activities to engage students and provide them with the skills to bring back to their schools and communities.
Paso High School’s Divy Emmons, Ava Friedling, and Elle Wangard facilitated and ran their own workshop, “Dear Little Me,” where participants learned to reconnect with their younger selves and practice self-love.
“I decided on self-love as the topic for our workshop because that topic is super near and dear to my heart. I think that it is such a universal issue that just gets worse and worse,” Emmons said.
Workshops such as “Dear Little Me,” allowed students to help themselves, so that they can spread the same message to others.
“It was really impactful to see the people in our workshops take in the information and actively find ways to improve their self-image,” Frielding said.
After the last speaker of the day, participants went out to celebrate at Disneyland.
“The youth summit is really cool because it gives kids that don’t have a lot of money the chance to experience things such as Disneyland,” said Abigail Wren, a sophomore at San Luis Obispo High School.
After a few more speeches the following day, SLO County students depart on two party buses, ready to bring change back to their own schools and communities.
