Ryan Chartrand
The terms “global warming” and “climate change” are now ubiquitous in America. Over the past year, newspaper articles and television specials on environmental issues have reached a fever-pitch, making awareness of ecological problems nearly unavoidable.
Earlier this month, Massachusetts defeated the United States Environmental Protection Agency in a major victory for global warming believers everywhere. Despite a growing awareness of environmental problems, and a continually expanding federal commitment to solve them, there are still too many people in Washington pointing fingers and not enough dedicated to developing comprehensive climate change solutions.
As the next generation of American leaders, today’s college students are already stepping up in an effort to create a cleaner, greener tomorrow. Students in America are enthusiastically taking on the challenge of solving climate change problems, rather than just finding someone to blame for them.
Together, young environmentalists have held policymakers to the flame and won some major victories in the fight against climate change. The battle is far from over, however, and momentum in the green movement is stronger now than it has ever been before.
There are opportunities to get involved all over Cal Poly’s campus. Students have launched successful recycling and energy campaigns in the past and will continue to do so in the future. One interesting program taking place at Cal Poly is called Focus the Nation. The program is a national teach-in set to take place on January 31st, 2008.
Creators of Focus the Nation have set a goal of involving 1,000 high schools, colleges and universities in the program. This means that an incredibly large number of students around the country would be able to get class credit for participating in discussions about climate change on January 31st. The purpose of this teach-in is to engage these students and faculty directly before the presidential primaries. This would encourage presidential candidates to address climate change issues and also educate voters so that they may better scrutinize the statements that candidates make.
Cal Poly is participating in the event. Currently, Focus the Nation organizers at Cal Poly are looking for more people to assist in the monumental effort of focusing our school community on climate change solutions. Speakers need to be contacted, logistics resolved and panel discussions planned. There is a great deal of work to do and a lot of fun to be had doing it. If you would like to be involved in the organization of Focus the Nation at Cal Poly, please contact student planners at focusthenationslo@gmail.com.