Moyer students concerned about the rainforest took concrete steps to raise awareness and come up with a plan to help.

By Robin Gee

The environment was front and center at the September meeting of the Fort Thomas Independent Schools District board.

Moyer Principal Dawn Laber
shared a story about how a very special new project got started at her
school. She was in her office one day and was told a group of boys
wanted to talk to her about something – but it was not what she
expected.

“I’m waiting for a conflict I need to
resolve or a problem that’s going on, but they said, ‘We want to save
the Amazon rainforest.'” After getting over her initial surprise, Laber
asked the students if they had a plan and, indeed, they did.

“They
had been talking about it,” explained Laber. “They watched the news and
were hearing about it from their families and took some passion to it
… I asked them some tough questions about their plan…They had to
really think it through.”

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Yet the students did exactly
that and returned the next day with more ideas and answers to her
questions. They were serious. When the principal asked over the loud
speaker if those interested in the rainforest would come to her office,
she saw the number of students interested had tripled. The students had
already been talking about the issue to their friends and classmates.

Three
of the students presented at the school board meeting and shared solid
ideas about how they could help. They said they wanted to first make
people aware of the issue, but then they had a plan to take their
concern a step farther.

Henry W. outlined the
problem. “Fires are burning the Amazon rainforest, and it’s an ecosystem
the whole world depends on. And we really need it to live, it creates
oxygen for us. And these are intentional fires. Nearly 1.8 million acres
have been burned at this point in time,” he said.

The
students were passionate but realistic about what they could do to have
an impact. “We just have one idea. We know we can’t fix the Amazon
rainforest, but we thought we could create awareness so we could educate
people and show the world the importance of working together to
understand what happens when humans hurt the environment,” explained Eli P.

The
students created posters and are putting them all over school to share
information on the importance and urgency of the situation.

“If
something’s happening in our world, it’s happening to us all. I’m part
of a small group of kids trying to make a big difference and protect our
future. Just imagine, flames engulfing rich trees of the rainforest,
creatures losing their homes and a great ball of smoke covering our
atmosphere… The Amazon rainforest produces 20 percent of our oxygen
and holds approximately 90 billion tons of carbon dioxide. Some people
call it the lungs of our earth. Unique creatures live in the Amazon
rainforest such as mountain gorillas, poison dart frogs and green
anaconda. Due to the fire, these animals are becoming more endangered,”
said Chanith A.

“You might be wondering how a
small group of kids supposed to do this? Well, we are taking a small
step but hoping it will make a big difference in the future,” he added.

The students have an ambitious plan to seek out help from the Fort Thomas Forest Conservancy
and their classmates and community. “Our proposal is that we think we
should plant one tree for every thousand acres that has burned. We want
to ask our school to donate seeds so the Conservancy, and we could plant
more trees to help our environment. We’d like to see if they like this
idea and listen to other ideas that might help us. We want to work with
the Conservancy to help our community,” said Henry.

At
the end of their presentation, which they plan to also give to the
Conservancy, they said in unison, “We know we are small, but we can make
a big difference in our community.”

Excellence in Environmental Education

Colleen Epperson
was also in the audience at the school board meeting. She runs the AP
Environmental Science program at Highlands High School as well as the
school’s Envirothon team. Laber noted that one day soon, Epperson may have new students for her team when the Moyer group reaches high school.

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Epperson’s class and program recently received the state’s top honor for K-12 environmental education from the Kentucky Association for Environmental Education.
She attributes earning the Excellence in Environmental Education Award
to the longevity of the program and the Envirothon team, entering its
10th year this year.

She took the opportunity to share
what the Envirothon is. “The team is five students who will compete
against other schools across the state for the region in the areas of
aquatics, wildlife, forestry, soils and a current event. This year’s
current event has to do with water resources. They have to score 350
points to qualify for state. We’ve been qualified for state for a couple
of years now.”

Epperson also had the opportunity to
visit the Amazon rainforest this summer. “I want to give a shout out to
the school system because they were able to send me…and I brought back
a plethora of opportunities and experiences for our students here at
Highlands.”

RELATED: Highlands Wins Award for Excellence in Environmental Education