Virginia Girl Scout Nets PETA Award for Gold Project

peta2 Recognizes High School Senior for Promoting Ban on Animal Tests, Rallying Her Peers to Shop Cruelty-Free

For Immediate Release:
February 3, 2017

Contact:
Megan Wiltsie 202-483-7382

Virginia Beach resident Anne Fentress is already the recipient of a Gold Award—the highest achievement in Girl Scouts—and her project, titled “Ending Cosmetic Animal Testing One Paw at a Time,” has also landed her a Hero to Animals Award from peta2, PETA’s youth division.

Fentress, a member of Girl Scout Troop 558 and a senior at Bishop Sullivan Catholic High School, dedicated her project to her dog, Brownie, after learning that hundreds of thousands of animals are poisoned and killed in cosmetics tests every year around the world. She created a traveling workshop on DIY cruelty-free cosmetics, presented a youth workshop on cruelty-free shopping, and advocated for the Humane Cosmetics Act, which would ban cosmetics tests on animals in the U.S., by organizing a letter-writing campaign to Virginia legislators, meeting with former U.S. Rep. Scott Rigell of Virginia, and even traveling to Washington to speak out in support of the bill.

“peta2 is recognizing Anne Fentress for her tireless work to help all rabbits and mice who are caged, poisoned, and blinded in archaic, cruel cosmetics tests,” says peta2 Senior Director Marta Holmberg. “She is already a leader of the generation that will make the future a kinder place for animals everywhere.”

Cosmetics tests on animals are not required by law in the U.S. and have been banned in the European Union as well as Australia, India, Israel, New Zealand, Norway, and Turkey. While some businesses still test their products on animals, more than 2,400 compassionate companies—including wet n wild, NYX, Urban Decay, Kat Von D Beauty, and Too Faced—use only modern, non-animal methods to test their products and ingredients. PETA encourages all compassionate shoppers to make cruelty-free shopping easy by using its global online database of companies that don’t test on animals.

Anyone can be a hero to animals by buying only products that weren’t tested on them, choosing vegan meals, refusing to wear fur, and always adopting rather than buying companion animals. peta2—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on or abuse in any other way”—is featuring Fentress on its Heroes page. She’ll also receive a framed certificate.

For more information on ways that young people can help animals, please visit peta2.com.