GUILDERLAND — Elijah Sharma wants to be a makeup artist with heart.
"When I grow up," he said, "I want to focus on youth and cosmetics and fashion as linked to animal welfare...It would be cool to push brands of makeup that have stopped animal testing and brands of clothing that have stopped using furs."

He is off to a good start.
Sharma, who helped found an animal-rights group at Guilderland High School, has won an Outstanding Activist Award from peta2. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals cited Sharma’s "successful efforts to have a dissection choice policy for students adopted at his school and for expanding the cafeteria’s menu to include vegan options."
He said of winning the award, "I was really happy about it because I respect the work PETA has done...We’ve used their resources and materials in our campaigns for three years now."
Sharma is co-president with Corrina Goutos of the Last Chance for Animals at Guilderland High School. Both Altamont residents, they were recently interviewed by the Humane Society of the United States; the interview is posted on the Humane Teen website, www.humaneteen.org/"q=node/633. The group has six million members, Sharma said.
Sharma has also gotten exposure on the peta2.com website as a "Star Street Teamer," with pictures and an interview posted. Peta2, a more radical group than the Humane Society, calls itself "the world’s largest youth animal rights organization."
"Each month, they focus on one of their activists," Sharma said. "Our group has gotten a lot of response. They linked our website. I’ve been getting a lot of contact from individual activists."

Sharma, 16, helped found Last Chance during his freshman year. He is now a junior. Next year, as a senior, he plans to start his career training in a vo-tech program and, after graduating from high school, he wants to go to beauty school.

Sharma is a vegan, which means he doesn’t eat any meat or animal products like milk, eggs, or cheese.
"I’ve been raised to be kind and tolerant and respectful," he told The Enterprise last year for an article about the club. (See www.AltamontEnterprise.com, under "Archives" for March 29, 2007.)

The first club accomplishment Sharma named was getting vegetarian burgers on the menu at the school cafeteria. This year, he said, Last Chance is pushing to have soy milk and other vegan options added to the menu.

The group, which uses the name of a national organization but isn’t governed by it, said Sharma, has circulated petitions for many animal-rights causes.
Its slogan is: "Improving the lives of animals and people through education, activism, and involvement."

Last year, the club held a protest to advocate for a ban of dissection and vivisection in biology classes. The school policy has been to allow students to opt out of dissection labs, Michael Piscitelli, the supervisor for math and science at the high school, told The Enterprise last year. "If a student objects because they’re afraid they’ll get sick or because they’re philosophically against it, we’ll give them an alternate assignment," he said at the time. Not many students chose to opt out, he said.

After talking with members of Last Chance, it was agreed the opt-out policy would be better publicized, Piscitelli said last year. Teachers now include a statement about it in their course outlines and inform students of their ability to opt out during the first week of school, and parents are informed during the school’s open house.

Sharma would like to see dissection banned altogether. Piscitelli said dissection lets students understand the complexity of animal tissue in ways that computer simulations don’t.
"We’re still working to have labs that don’t involve animals," said Sharma this week.
Last Chance is also reaching out to the community. "This summer, in Altamont," said Sharma, "we’ll have a free community event with vendors for vegan and vegetarian food."