Published: January 29, 2008 11:00 pm      

Focus On Global Warming: High school students lead the way

Sixteen-year-old Jack Kerby-Miller was so concerned about the effects of global warming on the planet that he decided to do something to stop it.

With participation from a team of other students, Kerby-Miller organized Glen Lake School's participation in Focus the Nation on Wednesday and Thursday.

"The idea of Focus the Nation is to have a series of nationwide symposia composed of more than 1,000 schools, colleges, churches and other civic organizations that meet on one day, to come up with solutions and create resolutions toward changes that are needed to stop global warming," said the Glen Lake School sophomore, who initiated his school's role as host of the event for the community.

Billed as the largest teach-in in U.S. history, Focus the Nation is preparing millions of students to become leaders in the challenge to reduce global warming. It is estimated that some 1,400 schools and over a million students are involved to date, said Kerby-Miller, who lives in Maple City.

Kerby-Miller said he learned about the event about a year ago. He had watched Al Gore's documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth." Less than two weeks later, his mother received an annual newsletter from her alma mater Lewis & Clark College in Oregon.

"I was reading it and learned about Focus the Nation and that it was dreamed up by Eban Goodstein, a professor at the college who is taking a sabbatical to organize the movement," said the teen.

Kerby-Miller talked to teachers, his principal, the superintendent and school board. All gave thumbs up to setting aside a half day on Jan. 31 to participate in the national event.

He asked classmates who he thought would be interested in it to help him. A core group of about 10 teens have been working for months in their spare time to make it happen.

"I don't have time to work on it during school so I work at home whenever I have a spare second," said Kerby-Miller.

The teach-in will kick off on Wednesday night with an opportunity to view an hour long Web-cast of "The 2% Solution." It will be broadcast on Live Earth Day Network TV at 8 p.m., just inside the high school entrance.

"The idea of the broadcast is to discuss how we need to cut two percent a year for the next 40 years in developed countries in order to hold global warming enough to help save our planet," said Kerby-Miller.

On the following day from 12:30 to 3 p.m., Kerby-Miller and his classmates have organized activities and speakers to talk about global warming solutions. He has also engaged local businesses to come in and set up booths on such topics as carbon-reducing technologies, green businesses, Community Supported Agriculture farms, energy-saving products and other information and ideas that will help lower carbon emissions.

"They will promote both the idea of energy-saving ideas like CFL light bulbs and emphasize the importance of energy savings by people purchasing from local resources," added the teen.

Kerby-Miller stressed that the symposium is not just for students. He is strongly encouraging community members to attend.

"We're really encouraging the bigger community to come to this," he said. "We're letting people know that global warming is a really big issue.

"I'm just hoping that people will understand what they can do to stop global warming."

In the meantime Kerby-Miller said his family has been doing what they can to reduce their carbon footprint, from composting and recycling to using compact fluorescent light bulbs and replacing plastic bags with eco-friendly recycled and reusable bags.

Kerby-Miller also stressed that this a nonpartisan event.

"As students we hope that this message about what we are doing doesn't come across as something political. Global warming isn't political, it is real, and it isn't about being an environmentalist either," he said. "It is about hoping that we can have a world that can sustain us in the future and trying to do what we can now, to be sure that happens."

For more information about Glen Lake School and their participation in Focus the Nation please visit www.focusthenation.org or contact Kerby-Miller at justjkm3rd@aol.com.

What you can do

Start here with some simple lifestyle changes:

1. Buy food and other products with less packaging or reusable/recyclable packaging instead of those in non-recyclable packaging.

2. Replace your current washing machine with a low-energy, low-water-use, energy efficient machine. Wash clothes in cold water, not hot.

3. Turn down your water heater thermostat; 120 degrees is usually hot enough.

4. Buy energy-efficient compact fluorescent bulbs for your most used lights.

5. Install a solar water heater system to help provide your hot water.

6. Recycle all of your household's waste newsprint, cardboard, glass, plastic and metal.

7. Wrap your water heater in an insulating jacket.

8. Caulk and weather-strip around doors and windows to plug air leaks.

9. Leave your car at home two days a week (walk, bike or take public transportation to work instead).

10. Ask your utility company for a home energy audit to find out where your home is poorly insulated or energy-inefficient.

11. Insulate your home and tune up your furnaces.

12. Drive a fuel-efficient car (rated 32 mpg or more) or buy a new hybrid gasoline electric vehicle which gets 50 to 70 mpg.

-- From Climate Solutions (www.climatesolutions.org)