Helping others is cool. It always has been and always should be.

In recent years I've seen a great momentum by youth to help others, which is really cool. It not only makes youth, especially teenagers, think outside the box, but also think outside the "me" box.

The "me" box is the little bubble that we all tend to live in at one time or another, usually in our carefree youth days. The "me" box contains only the concerns of what's going on with me, myself and I. Often people refer to it as living in a bubble, free from what's going on in the outside world.

But at some point that bubble pops and "me" turns to "we," the collective, the group, the rest of us on this crazy, orbiting rock.

It's nice to see youth when they grow outside that bubble, box or whatever. Certainly the students I met in the public affairs class at Burnsville High School are out there in the "we." And I'm sure there are more students where that came from.

I'm proud of today's youth who are willing to go out of bounds to help someone else whether it looks cool or not. Image can be everything in high school, but as we grow, mature, learn and just get older, image can become as fragile as a bubble and easily burst.

Perhaps it's the Internet's fault or the text message invasion, but thinking globally has caught on more in the past decade.

Service learning or volunteerism is not just about helping others. It also goes back to the "me" box/bubble. It teaches you how to become a person. By serving others, looking outside your bubble/box you learn more about yourself in the process.

Sometimes that learning process can be difficult, but if it weren't you might not learn. Other times looking outside yourself helps others determine who you are, which also comes back to looking cool.

To look cool you have to be cool and to be cool you have to like yourself. Helping others through service learning definitely works to your advantage that way. What better way to like who you are than to help someone else who needs it or inform others about a debilitating disease like diabetes, which the public affairs students have done this semester.

According to the American Diabetes Association Web site, 7 percent of people in this country has some form of diabetes.

The site has a risk test if you want to see if you're at risk for diabetes (for the "me" thinkers out there).

There's also a whole page with links on how to raise awareness, funds for research and reach out to those affected by the disease (for those "we" thinkers).

The public affairs students are getting the word out to younger generations about diabetes. What a great way to go from "me" to "we." Now that's cool.

Stefanie Briggs is a community editor at Sun Newspapers.

(You are invited to comment about this story on our website at www.mnsun.com and/or write a letter to the editor at suncurrentsouth@acnpapers.com.)

There's also a whole page with links on how to raise awareness, funds for research and reach out to those affected by the disease (for those "we" thinkers).

The public affairs students are getting the word out to younger generations about diabetes. What a great way to go from "me" to "we." Now that's cool.

Stefanie Briggs is a community editor at Sun Newspapers.

(You are invited to comment about this story on our website at www.mnsun.com and/or write a letter to the editor at suncurrentsouth@acnpapers.com.)