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Student Life: Making our voices heard

On March 15, there was a global walkout.
Brooks Secondary School Powell River
Brooks Secondary School students in Powell River walked out of class on Friday, March 15, to join a global protest in relation to climate inaction. Peak archive photo

On March 15, there was a global walkout. Students from all across the world, including at Brooks Secondary School in Powell River, made the collective decision to leave their classrooms and walk as an act of defiance and protest toward the lack of climate change action.

Now, after this movement, we need to ask ourselves: How are we going to continue?

Considering this event took place during school hours, there’s no doubt some students may have taken advantage of the opportunity and used it to skip class. Nonetheless, we still need to focus on the crisis at hand. The mere fact that such a large population can come together in such a way is astounding in itself, but it also only emphasizes how serious the situation is.

One day is not going change the world. Yes, we may have raised awareness to the issue, but this is the entire planet we’re talking about and if we don’t take action soon, it could mean the end.

We can start with small things; you don’t necessarily have to quit meat cold turkey and become vegan to help the planet. We can help out with recycling, by starting a compost at home, thinking twice about that extra packaging, and trying to eat more locally. We can’t all live the zero-waste healthy lifestyle dream, but we can ease ourselves into it with little changes on our own to help contribute to the cause.

Besides our own households, we as students have clubs to turn to that are offered by the school as well. We have environmental groups to help teach us more about the crisis and organizing events that focus on cleaning the community. And if that doesn’t inspire you, look into the walkout movement itself, meet the faces behind the idea and see just how life-changing their words are.

With the start of such a powerful breakthrough, we as young people are making way for the future generations to follow in our footsteps by proving our responsibility, and we’re taking life into our own hands. We are the first generation to ever have such a connection and we can use that to come together and make a difference.

If we stand side by side, make our voices heard, and make an effort in our own lives to change things, we can make a start in the right direction.

Macy How is a grade 11 student at Brooks Secondary School in Powell River.