Hey girls! Guess what? These days, green is more than just a great color for redheads; it’s a way of living too! Now, we’ve all heard of “going green,” but how can you actually get involved? Well, there are many great organizations and movements going around all over the country that you can get involved with! Here are some options to help you figure out where your time will be best spent:
The Sierra Club
This is an organization that has six main objectives:
- Curbing Carbon
- Moving Beyond Coal
- Clean Energy Solutions
- Green Transportation
- Resilient Habitats
- Safeguarding Communities
Their Web site is easy to navigate and offers details on each of the objectives. For example, the “Moving Beyond Coal” Objective offers a map of all the states and as you scroll over each state, it tells you how you can get involved in that state. The Sierra Club’s popularity has spread all over the country. Even celebrities like Marcia Cross (Desperate Housewives) endorse their campaigns to get children active. They have branches in all 50 states as well as the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. While you can make donations, you’re even better off trying to go to a meeting—find them on Facebook or on the Sierra Club’s website. They offer local outings, which are a great opportunity to go outdoors in your community! For more information, visit http://www.sierraclub.org.
Power Shift
Founded in 2004, Power Shift originated around the idea of creating an Energy Action Coalition. This coalition unites a variety of organizations and youth to promote and support the clean and just energy movement in North America. Their goal is to convince Congress to pass comprehensive climate and energy legislation.
Sophomore Caleb McRady of the University of South Carolina attended Power Shift last year. “It was really cool to go because it was people all over the country who really had a passion for rallying Congress for climate change and knew what they needed to do to make that change happen,” said McRady. At the start of 2010, Power Shift created the “Decade Campaign” in which through a set of local actions the youth will “Define Our Decade.” March 15-28th is Define Our Decade Weeks of Action and National Youth Vote. Power Shift promotes taking action into your own hands. They promote calling your local senators, signing their petitions and attending regional summits. Their website provides students with a clear map to help find a regional summit site near them. Get involved today!
The Real Food Challenge
This organization is all about food production. This includes the fair treatment of workers, equitable relationships with farmers and humanely treated animals. Real Food holds summits in six different locations across the country. Their website also offers the “Real Food Calculator” which helps to track institutional food purchasing. With 13 schools currently testing the calculator out, the organization says that “Real Food that is healthy, tastes good [and] builds community has the potential to inspire broad-scale social change.”
The calculator goes by a “light system.” Green light food means that it meets the highest standards for real food; yellow light food means that the food does a good job of meeting the standards but doesn’t meet the highest standards and red light food doesn’t meet the organization’s standards for real food.
How are you keeping it “green” in your community? Post your comments below!
Sources:
http://realfoodchallenge.org/ http://energyactioncoalition.org
http://www.sierraclub.org
Caleb McRady, sophomore at the University of South Carolina