GLENDALE HIGH SUMMIT TEAM SHADOWS EVENT FOR G-8 LEADERS TEENAGERS TRAVEL TO RUSSIA.

Byline: EUGENE TONG Staff Writer

GLENDALE -- They traveled to the city of Pushkin and Peter the Great with ideas to change society for the better, rubbed elbows with eight of the most powerful leaders in the world and got a front-row seat to geopolitics just as war broke out in the Middle East.

But what stayed with these Glendale High students who represented the United States at the Junior 8 Summit were the friendships forged and their determination to take a stand for the future. The conference sponsored by the Morgan Stanley Foundation brought teens from the Group of Eight industrialized nations to St. Petersburg, Russia, to shadow the G-8 Summit.

``There is always room for revolution,'' said Diana Perez, 16, part of the eight-person team -- the YinYangs -- who returned last week from the 12-day conference. Other members include Shaunt Attarian, 15; Rigo Benitez, 16; Edgar Hernandez, 16; Sergio Maciel, 15; Viannca Montesino, 15; Elaine Panlaqui, 15 and Kelly Velasquez, 15.

In between teleconferences with teens from around the world and tours of the Hermitage and Catherine the Great's palace, the YinYangs shared a table with J-8 delegates from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United Kingdom to work on an address to the G-8 leaders.

``We watched them mature in a completely unique environment,'' said Glendale High Principal Kathy Fundukian, who traveled with the students. ``They were expected to collaborate with others and focus on substantive issues, and they did. They listened.''

Their team's namesake guided their proposals to resolve such global problems as energy security and education opportunity. For example, they proposed heavy taxes on petroleum and oil products to promote development of alternative energy, and a tax on arms sales to finance education.

``There's no Utopia,'' Attarian said. ``But if you can balance some of the bad things with the good, things will improve.''

It's an informed optimism that sometimes clashed with the Realpolitik and homebound concerns of world leaders. Perez recalled an exchange she had with President George W. Bush about global warming and why the United States didn't sign the Kyoto Protocol, which aimed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.

``He said he didn't sign the Kyoto treaty because it wasn't beneficial to the United States,'' she said.

``We look at the long-term,'' Velasquez said. ``Adults are looking at the now. We're looking at things like when we're 50 years old, are we going to have the energy we have right now?''

Yet the tone of the conference changed when Israeli missiles struck Lebanon in response to the kidnapping of two of its soldiers by the Hezbollah militia.

``A lot of us were really disturbed by the event,'' Attarian said. ``We had watched some interview with (Russian President) Vladimir Putin and George W. Bush -- they were tense. You can tell a lot of stuff was going on.''

Attarian recalled a French J-8 delegate named Xavier, who questioned French President Jacques Chirac about the fighting, which has killed more than 300 civilians Friday.

``(Chirac) said it's too complicated to talk about right now,'' he said.

Still, the junior delegates got to work on an address covering the summit topics of education, infectious diseases, tolerance and energy security -- the core is the belief that ``education is the foundation of everything.''

Attarian said education could overcome the spread of disease, encourage energy conservation and even resolve ethnic, religious and racial strife -- even the ongoing violence in the Middle East.

``The fighting groups are not very tolerant of each other,'' he said. ``By educating them from an early age on tolerance, you can work to eradicate all of the infighting.''

Perez said this trip is only the beginning of their activism -- the team plans more collaboration with other 2006 J-8 delegates.

``If you have dedicated people, change can happen,'' she said.

eugene.tong(at)dailynews.com

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