Middle School Student Helps Make a Difference - Florida School Buses
Holly Thorpe is just your average middle school student with a not so average science fair project. Living in Miami, which experiences strong hurricanes and flooding, she recognized that climate change will affect her future, and her science project examined how much of an impact our actions can have on our health and the planet…
Thorpe’s science fair project measured the carbon dioxide levels inside and outside the buses at her school. Normal levels outside of the buses were around 1000ppm (parts per million). However, inside the buses the levels were above 5000 ppm- nearly ten times the Environmental Protection Agency’s recommended limit.
Illustration by Katie De Lusignan.
What is disconcerting isn’t just the amount of CO2 released by school buses, but what that does to our health. Levels of CO2 over 2000 ppm can cause illnesses, nausea, headaches, and asthma. Exposing children to these health threats every single day is a frightening thought. With more than 45,000 students riding district buses to and from school every day, parents and board members agreed a change was definitely in order.
While Thorpe didn’t necessarily set out to make such a drastic and significant change to her school district, her actions and intentions set in motion something that protects her and future generations to come. A small act can make a tremendous difference.
Youth Taking Action for the Climate
Thorpe is a wonderful example of youth taking action for the climate, but she is not the only youth making a difference alone. There are many young people taking a dramatic stand to make significant changes for the environment. Thorpe has her choice of role models; young activists who have set the stage for people like Thorpe to take a stand and make a difference.
Greta Thunberg - Solo Strike to Climate Activist Icon
The most prominent name that comes to mind when considering youth climate activists is Greta Thunberg. Named TIME Person of the Year in 2019 at just 16-years-old, Thunberg is an inspiration to students, activists, and even governments.
After learning about the climate crisis, Thunberg wanted to do something. In August of 2018, without any support from any institutions, organisation, or anyone to keep her company, Thunberg sat in front of Swedish Parliament for what became a school climate strike. Before long, though, Thunberg wasn’t just joined by others in Stockholm- hundreds of thousands of people joined her around the world for Fridays For Future school strikes for climate action.
Thunberg has also inspired world leaders to pay attention to the youth and their demands for environmental policy. Both French President Emmanuel Macron and former Irish President Mary Robinson have praised Thunberg’s efforts, claiming that children speaking out for their future is powerful and effective.
While Greta Thunberg’s persistence is effective for gaining promises and climate-friendly goals, it takes time to implement these changes. While time is running out, it is still very promising to see Thunberg inspiring other young people to take up the mantle. No matter how small you may seem, you can still make a difference.
Fridays For Future Around the World
Thunberg’s actions inspired youth activists around the world to take a stand. Many young people participate in weekly school strikes through Youth Climate Action and Fridays For Future organisations. Students as young as 13 and 14 have taken up the call to action through protests. Haven Coleman in the United States, Holly Gillibrand in Scotland, David Wicker from Italy, and Leah Namugerwa from Uganda are just some of the prominent young people using their voices to show how much they care.
Xiuhtezcatl Martinez- An Eco-Warrior at Any Age
Thunberg is indeed an icon, but she is far from the first youth climate activist. Xiuhtezcatl Martinez started on his journey as an environmentalist at the age of six. As the youth director of the environmental organization Earth Guardians, Martinez uses his youth-oriented platform to reach young people around the world.
Martinez already has quite a resume for an eco-warrior. In 2013, at the age of thirteen, he became the youngest person to receive the United States Volunteer Service Award and serve on President Obama’s youth council. Then, a mere five years later, Martinez was a leader in a group of twenty-one plaintiffs suing the United States federal government for its lack of action on climate change.
Describing himself as an indigenous eco hip hop artivist (artist and activist), Martinez helps youth connect to climate issues and empowers them to be the change the world needs. He uses music and social media to foster interest and concern for the environment.
Other Middle School Age Students Taking Action
Around the United States, other students are using science and their passion to help the world to fight climate change and pollution. In Oxnard, California, Fremont Middle School held a Zero Waste Week, where members of the Enviro Club collected signatures to end the use of polystyrene trays and plastic utensils in their school. After collecting more than 500 signatures, the students presented their petition to the school board and helped to implement a change to reusable options.
Around the world, programs help schools and communities become more environmentally friendly. Green Schools Projects in the UK is one example. This program provides resources and frameworks to help set schools up for success through green projects with their students. For example, students can conduct environmental audits on their school, present their findings to the school board, and share ideas for ways they can be more eco-conscious.
Thorpe’s science project, Fremont Middle School Enviro Club’s campaign, and Green Schools Projects are all exceptional, but they are not the exceptions. Students are helping communities become aware of environmental problems and coming up with manageable solutions. Middle school students from High Tech Middle North County in San Marcos, California led several projects to raise awareness about plastic pollution in their community. They organized a beach clean, created a children’s book about pollution in the ocean, and raised money to purchase a water bottle filling station at their school. Through an informational website, social media, and an in-person exhibit for the community, the students helped to shift the culture of their school to be more focused on conservation actions.
Adults Learning From Kids
The work that young people are doing for the environment is note-worthy. It can be so easy to look over a child, pat them on the head, and ignore what they are telling us as a society. But research shows that adults learn from their kids nearly as much as kids learn from adults.
Science is clear about the effects, causes, and problems with climate change. However, it’s not that people don’t understand the science,it’s more that they have a difficult time accepting it. From young people,our children, grandchildren, or even our friends’ children,we can learn how to process and accept the science, and better yet, how to change our behaviours to do something productive about it.
While it’s difficult for adults to put aside political beliefs and agendas (on any side of opposing political systems), children don’t hold a particular bias when they learn about climate change. In fact, as well as Fridays For Future and the Green Schools Project, many social change movements suggest that it is the youth that motivates adults to change their behaviour.
A 2018 study demonstrated the phenomenon of children teaching adults. Students and adults were surveyed before and after a targeted learning session for children on climate change. After the class, the students shared what they learned with their parents and guardians. In the survey following the class and family discussion, the children’s concern for climate change increased. But the awareness and concern also increased in the adults as well.
Healthy Students, Healthy Planet
Learning more about the environment can change one person’s mind, an entire community, and even the world.
What started as a science fair project led Holly Thorpe to change her school and her community, and help make a positive impact on the planet. She presented scientific evidence that current practice affected the health of the students, and that there was a better solution.
The district applied for a grant from a settlement fund from Volkswagen to bring in new electric buses.
When the new buses rolled in, Thorpe was one of the first to take a ride. She brought her CO2 measuring tools along with her. The 5000 parts per million were cut down to 2000 ppm. This simple action changed lives and inspires others to know each one of us can do our part to change the world.
Thank you to Katie De Lusignan for her beautiful illustration. You can find more of her work on her Instagram @myhandsmadethese.
PJ Beaven
PJ Beaven lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and two cats. She believes fitness is a positive endeavor, not a chore. Her program ZooFit makes fitness fun, engaging, and empowering by building healthy habits through positive training methods while connecting them to conservation so we have a better impact on the environment. PJ is the Queen of Play, teaching us how a change in our mindset can change our lives and change the world.