JENNIFER OCHSTEIN
Tribune Correspondent

CULVER -- The girls from California have talked Samantha Lee into changing her view on makeup and nail polish.

But, perhaps more importantly, her ideas on leadership are getting a makeover, too.

Samantha, a senior, was among Culver Girls Academy students whose views changed after attending the recent Culver Women's Celebration.

The conference featured a group of teenagers from Marin County, Calif., who fought to get legislation against cosmetics whose chemicals may cause cancer and birth defects.

California now requires cosmetics and personal-care products manufacturers to disclose ingredients that are suspected of carrying health risks.

For Samantha, it was an eye opener in two ways.

She said she had never heard of the health risks.

"I've changed all of my products," she said. Now she buys cosmetics and personal-care items that use natural ingredients instead of harsh chemicals.

But she also recognizes now that a group of girls can mobilize for their safety and the safety of other women and, in their own way, change their world.

"It's amazing," said Samantha, who is from Culver. "They're teens like us. To see girls this young be so successful ... I'm so proud of them, and I'm happy they're here to explain how they got the laws changed."

This was the California group's first venture outside of California. The girls said they want to go global because it's a global problem.

Culver Academies senior Alexis Clay, 18, was instrumental in bringing the girls of the Safe Cosmetics Campaign to the Indiana school.

Alexis is the second-rotation senior prefect, the highest leadership role at the college preparatory school.

She was on a leadership board who voted to bring the group to the academies for the Culver Women's Celebration.

The theme of the celebration was "Anything's Possible," which typified the direction the girl's leadership program at Culver Academies is heading, said Alexis, who is from Rochester.

The upperclassmen in leadership at the girls academy, she said, wanted to show the younger girls -- freshmen and sophomores -- that no matter how young they may seem, they can cause changes.

And the California girls, she added, do not have leadership training at their schools like the girls at Culver Academies do. They did what they did because they were passionate about their cause.

And that's what seems so impressive about them to senior Culver Academies student Janeen Phillips, from South Bend.

She said there are very many capable girls at the academies who can take on causes to effect the surrounding community.

Hearing what their counterparts from California have done, Janeen said, "empowers them to take their own leadership initiatives."