Mary Anne Hitt
Last week was a big one for me - I sent my daughter, Hazel, off to her first day of kindergarten. I'll never forget how she gave me a big, big hug, and then looked back at me over shoulder one last time before heading into her classroom, and into her new adventures as a school-aged kid.
Later that same week, I had the honor of visiting the White House to attend a White House back-to-school climate education event, where educators and student leaders came together to share resources and ideas about climate education. I was there with a team from the Emmy-winning climate series Years of Living Dangerously, for the release of their fantastic new curriculum to accompany the series, which was developed by the National Wildlife Federation (NWF) - you can find it at ClimateClassroom.org. It was especially wonderful to be reunited with Anna Jane Joyner who co-starred in the "Preacher's Daughter" episode that I appeared in, executive producer Joel Bach, and Carey Stanton of NWF who spearheaded the creation of the curriculum.
The curriculum is excellent, and it will be a great resource to students and educators around the world. It uses short video links from the series to help students understand a wide range of issues, including climate science, deforestation, fossil fuels, clean energy, and how to navigate conversations with climate skeptics. It provides teachers with all the resources they need to talk about, and make class assignments around, these episodes and topics. And the celebrity correspondents featured in the series will certainly help wake up a classroom - I can tell you from personal experience that just saying the name "Ian Somerhalder" in a high school auditorium definitely gets you the students' attention, along with a lot of wild screaming.
The head of NOAA noaa.org, Dr. Kathryn Sullivan, kicked off the event with the shocking news that July 2015 was the hottest month in recorded history, and 2015 is on track to be our hottest year ever (NOAA is the federal agency that houses the National Weather Service and National Storm Prediction Center, and also tracks our country's weather and climate data). But the White House countered that sobering news with stories of leadership from inspiring young people, lots of resources for educators, and a clear commitment to increasing our climate literacy nationwide.
As a mom, this was music to my ears. Just in Hazel's first days at kindergarten, I'd already been told that the kids won't play outside in her afterschool program on hot and muggy days, because some of the kids have asthma. As our climate changes and hot days increase, medical science tells us that the future will just get harder for kids with asthma, and more will join their ranks, just one of many dangers climate change poses to our children's future.
The young people at the White House understood this, and they're doing everything they can to turn the tide, from installing solar panels and starting recycling programs at their schools, to reducing energy use at home, to mentoring younger kids about careers in science, technology, and math. I was especially pleased to run into my old friend Amee Kapadia, a young woman who joined us in April at an event with Michael Bloomberg to announce the next phase of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal partnership with Bloomberg Philanthropies. Back in April, Amee shared her personal experiences of not only suffering from the health effects of coal pollution, but also experiencing the clean air benefits of a coal plant retirement. At the White House, Amee told me she's now working to have electric vehicle charging stations installed at her high school, which has already gone solar thanks to efforts by students - what superstars.
Now that Hazel has kicked off her school years, I'm so grateful for the Years curriculum and the other climate education resources shared at the White House, the Obama Administration's commitment to climate literacy, and the support for these young leaders from the highest levels of our government. Most of all, I'm thankful for these young leaders themselves. At the White House last week, their optimism and determination to solve the climate crisis was electrifying.
As one of the student leaders, Jack Ruiz of New York, put it: "No problem is too big for anyone." I couldn’t agree more.