Green Team Leadership Crew Inspired by Brower Youth Awards
Live Oak's student environmental group, the Green Team Leadership Crew attended the Brower Youth Awards in Berkeley in October, giving them some inspiring new ideas for their work on the Live Oak campus this year.
A group of environmentally-driven middle school students, hungry for opportunities to fight climate change and reduce our community’s footprint on the planet, are bringing their eco-stewardship and climate justice prowess to the brand-new Green Team Leadership Crew (the “GTLC”)! The GTLC is actively working on projects and initiatives that our community will be seeing throughout the year, but recently had the opportunity to gain inspiration by attending the Brower Youth Awards at the Freight & Salvage in Berkeley. While at the event, we heard from young environmental activists from around the country who are working on powerful climate justice projects including carbon neutral high schools, fossil fuel divestment for universities, and prairie restoration. The GTLC students were buzzing with ideas afterwards, and are even more energized to lead this year's school-wide Green Initiative. Caitlin said, “It was really inspiring to hear all those people talking about the things they accomplished when they were just about our age… it gave me a sense that I could do something for the world, that it doesn’t have to be the people who have a lot of power already — it could be someone like me who can change our climate!” Harry shared that “they made me feel like I could make a difference and help the world. Like I could change something in the world… all these young people, pausing their lives and deciding to make a difference in the world.”
After hearing from the Brower Youth Awards winners, the GTLC students felt the spark of action stemming from the projects the youth awards winners spoke about. Gibson and Serenity want to work on projects right here at Live Oak like Annika Weber did for her school “because that would change other schools around us!” Anika was inspired by Ilana Cohen’s project because “she was able to make a really big impact with a small group of people, and we can too!”
Anika is very excited about teaching and working with the lower school students, and said that “there are many different aspects of helping the environment that are really important, and we can all work together.” About her role on the GTLC, Serenity said that she wants to get others interested in and involved with helping the environment: “A lot of people don’t really know what’s happening, don’t know why they should care, or don’t know what they can do to help, and the GTLC can be that bridge.”
Keep your eyes peeled for more from this group of budding environmental leaders!
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