Port Washington teen earns Congressional Award Gold Medal
Sofia Leder, of Port Washington, recently received the Congressional Award Gold Medal, the highest honor for youth issued by Congress. She is pictured here with Paul D. Schreiber High School Principal Kathryn Behr and Port Washington Superintendent Gaurav Passi. Credit: Port Washington Union Free School District
Sofia Leder's dedication to helping the environment has earned her Congress' highest honor for young people.
The Port Washington teen has spent the past several years making her community more eco-friendly by teaching children and residents about recycling, composting and keeping local waterways clean through several local organizations. She has also traveled to Albany each of the past four years to urge lawmakers to support climate change legislation.
Those efforts earned her the Congressional Award Gold Medal this spring, the highest honor Congress bestows on young people. She was among 877 recipients nationwide, including 25 from New York. To qualify, she completed 400 hours of community service over a two-year span, among meeting other goals.
"I feel like once you start environmental volunteering and advocacy, it’s hard to stop," said Sofia, 17, who is entering her senior year at Paul D. Schreiber High School in Port Washington. "I would’ve done a lot of volunteering without this award, but putting a medal to it made it all the more meaningful."
Much of Leder's volunteer work centered on environmental education. Through the nonprofit Transition Town Port Washington, she delivered presentations at local libraries and schools on topics including reducing plastic waste. Last summer, she also led weekly presentations at Baxter Pond in partnership with the nonprofit ReWild Long Island, where she educated children on how water quality affects health.
Since 2023, she has advocated for climate change laws in Albany as part of Youth Day of Action through the student-led climate organization TREEage.
"Each year they give us different environmental legislation bills that we push for," she said. "It’s really a community of students who all want to make a change in New York; it’s very inspiring."
Her environmental work also includes volunteering at a youth climate summit held every other year by the Port Washington-based organization Residents Forward for 100 environmentally-minded students. Last year, she led a session on reducing waste at the event, which drew about 250 students to the Port Washington Public Library.
A Girl Scout, Leder also reinstated a recycling program in the Port Washington school district as part of her Gold Award, the highest achievement within the Girl Scouts of the USA.
Paul D. Schreiber Principal Kathryn Behr said Sofia "embodies the very best" of students.
"She approaches every opportunity by asking how she can leave our school and community better than she found it," Behr said. "She is thoughtful, driven and deeply committed to taking meaningful action that creates lasting change."
Michael R. Ebert is an education researcher and has worked for Newsday in various capacities since 2003. He was part of an 11-person team named as 2008 Pulitzer Prize finalists for investigative coverage of the LIRR's platform safety issues.
