Eight Cal Poly students and alumni who attended the UN Global Climate Summit in Copenhagen were discouraged by the lack of political involvement, so they decided to implement change on a smaller scale with an Internet campaign called “Help Us Mom” and by giving lectures about climate change.
City regional and planning graduate Mike Marcus struggled to write a letter conveying his frustration regarding climate change to a politician whom he had never met. He decided the best way to communicate his feelings was to pretend he was writing to his mother. This idea developed into the group’s online campaign.
HelpUsMom.com encourages young people from around the country to write letters about climate change to the people who care about them most.
Mechanical engineering alum Neil Bulger said the campaign was born near the end of the conference as their group was becoming increasingly frustrated by the lack of political progress.
“It was a way to channel our feelings of deep frustration and confusion as to how 120 heads of state were together in one room and they couldn’t make any decisions,” he said.
With the right motivation and right mix of people, the idea for the campaign and its execution was formed, he said.
“We were in Copenhagen with friends that had created campaigns before, we had people that could do marketing, we had people that could make the Web page, so we just devoted the rest of our time there to really getting the nuts and bolts of this campaign in order,” Bulger said.
The campaign’s goal is to initiate dialogue within families across the United States. The “letters to mom” written with the help of HelpUsMom.com will be collected and mailed to the U.S. Congress and President Obama on Mother’s Day 2010.
“It may sound kind of stupid to be honest, but we all thought that it was going to be a very effective way because (when) writing a letter to your mother, she can’t say no to it and it’s mother instinct to protect her child,” environmental protection and management senior Michael Symmes said.
Symmes, along with Templeton high school junior Kayla Clark, who also went to the conference, lectured to a crowd of nearly 100 people at Atascadero Lake Pavilion last Wednesday night. They talked about the people they met, the lectures they attended and what they gained by attending the conference.
The lecture was a resounding success according to those who attended.
“I’ve lived here for 30 years and I’m shocked by how many people showed up,” Atascadero resident David Broadwater said.
Symmes said it is his mission to open people’s minds to the critical environmental issues facing society.
“I just hope people get a broader sense of what the actual scope of climate change is. A lot of people, in my honest opinion, are pretty ignorant about the issue … I want people to think critically,” Symmes said.