Environmental club triggers alarm to wake Wildcat nation, Oshkosh to climate endangerment

The Green Alarm is paving West a greener path to an environmentally friendly and conscious world. In its third year advocating for climate change and action, the group provides the student body with unique, sustainable opportunities. Seniors Abigail Furcy and Hannah Chung, who founded the club in 2020, want to see a change in the local environment and start a chain of education for all.

“We created the Green Alarm because we were thinking about the education we have surrounding climate change, and we realized that it’s basically non-existent,” Furcy said. “It’s not in any of the curriculums or in any of the classes, and so we needed a way for the student body to become educated. Since that couldn’t happen in any class, the best way was through a club.”

The majority of people, especially students, don’t understand the impact they have on the environment, which is something that club advisor Rebecca Kocha hopes to educate West about. 

“We are always consistently working on ways to inform the West community and the Oshkosh community on small and easy steps and changes they can make that reduce their overall contribution to climate change,” she said. “We encourage others to shift their mindset to be more considerate of their carbon footprint and see how easy it can be to lessen their impact on the climate crisis.” 

To meet this goal, the club organizes special activities to promote sustainability while keeping things interesting and inclusive. 

“We just made leaf garlands out of real leaves and hung them around the school as a sustainable alternative to the plastic leaf garlands stores often sell,” said sophomore club member Emma Toney.

Most short-term projects presented by the Green Alarm are season and holiday centered. For Thanksgiving, the group is bringing back a tasty tradition from last year. 

“We had our annual Vegan Thanksgiving,” Furcy said. “This always attracts the most people because everyone loves food. By doing an event like this, we can show everyone that vegan food isn’t bad, while also getting them to open up their taste buds to unique foods that are better for the environment.”

Furcy and the rest of the group also have exciting ideas for the festive holiday season.

“We’re working on a clothing drive for the winter,” she said. “We’ll also definitely do sustainable gift wrapping again, which is wrapping gifts with newspaper rather than throwing it away. We’re also talking about making decorations out of things that would normally be thrown away or things that could just be reused in general.”

Gift wrapping in sustainable materials not only saves the environment, but it saves money and provides a unique look to any gift. 

“Honestly, we think an unwrapped gift is just as wonderful as a wrapped one,” said Kocha. “Sometimes a simple recycled or repurposed bow or card is enough. Plus, it saves you time and money. Reuse old wrapping paper, newspaper, magazines, and more to make unique and interesting gift wrap. Consider sourcing gift wrap made of recycled paper or gift wrap that is 100% biodegradable.”

Along with these short-term activities, the Green Alarm has a larger project that has finally manifested into a real possibility. 

“Right now, the biodigester is a project that we’ve been trying to put into place for a long time, and we finally just got it to work,” said Furcy. “We have a contact from UWO that Hannah, the other co-founder, has been talking to, and we’re actually going to start around the beginning of December. We’re going to have bins in the lunch rooms for people to put their food waste in, not any plastics or other recyclables. If that works, after a couple months, we’ll present it to the school board. If they approve it, we’ll actually be able to implement it into all schools.”

The biodigester is a unique opportunity for food waste to be turned into renewable energy for schools to use. After two years of trying, Chung has finally set a path in place for this idea to become a reality.

“For Global Academy, we have to create a senior year capstone project that encapsulates all of our journeys thus far and everything that we’ve learned to become global citizens,” she said. “For my project, I decided to choose sustainability because that’s as global as you can get, as we all share the same Earth.”

Chung spent a chunk of her summer studying and preparing to make this the best it could be. 

“Over the summer, I went on a CIEE program trip and studied sustainability there,” she said. “I also took a Harvard course, the design of renewable energy projects. For my final project, I decided to create a model of what it would be like if the OASD transferred all their food waste to the UWO biodigester. And then, I decided to incorporate that into real life with my capstone project. So, it’s finally coming to fruition, and I’m very excited for everything that’s to come.”

While the biodigester is a larger-scale project that the club will take on themselves, there are other smaller, easier projects that anyone can do.

“There are lots of ways students can help the environment,” said Toney. “Try using reusable containers and bags rather than the one-use plastic ones for lunches, snacks, etc. Also, not buying from fast fashion brands like Shein is important because they’re extremely bad for the environment and have a lot of unethical practices.”

Sophomore Ciera Striley also pushes the use of reusable containers instead of single-use and then making sure to intentionally dispose of waste properly. 

 “Students should bring a reusable water bottle to school instead of buying a plastic water bottle at lunch since that causes a lot of waste,” she said. “Students at West can also improve by picking up their waste and trash and cleaning up anything they can outdoors.”

Kocha stresses the importance of making small choices every day to make much larger differences.

“Consider some of the small changes you can make to your lifestyle to reduce your contribution to climate change and encourage others to do the same,” she said. “It really is all about mindset, so it helps to build a habit of considering the effects of our actions on the environment.”

For those looking to learn how to become a more mindful person, the Green Alarm hosts meetings every Friday during W-Hour in Ms. Kocha’s room: S12. 

“People should join Green Alarm because you will not find a group of students that is as motivated and passionate about the climate crisis as those in there,” said Furcy. “I can tell that everyone here genuinely cares and genuinely wants to show up and make a difference. It’s really nice and comforting to be a part of a community like that.”

Chung has similar ideas and hopes that more people join in the fight to change the world. 

 “People should join Green Alarm if they want to create and see some change,” she said. “You don’t have to be the most environmentally friendly tree-hugger person in the world, you can just come as you are.”

by Haniya Mecci and Jazmine Blustin

Oshkosh West Index Volume 119 Issue III

November 28 2022