On Friday 20th, 2019, there was a climate strike, where student activists gathered in Grant Park at the intersection of Columbus Drive and Roosevelt at 11 a.m. The goal of these students was to attract the attention of the Illinois assembly and Governor J.B. Pritzker in an attempt to push for the legislation of the Illinois Clean Energy Jobs Act. The purpose of this is to move Illinois to 100% renewable energy, and would incentivize electric cars and more charging stations for them. Since students at Whitney Young care about the future of the Earth, they decided to take action, either by helping organize the strike and raise awareness about the issues, or by walking.

“For the past few weeks I’ve been working with different organizations such as the Sierra Club and the Chicago Youth Alliance for Climate Action(CYACA) to organize as many people as I could around Chicago for this event. Climate Change is an issue which affects all humans on the planet, and the only way to fix it is if we all come together and handle it as soon as possible. The climate strike is an amazing opportunity for thousands of people to show their support for active change in our laws and regulations,” said Alonda Lozano, ‘20.

Kimberly Vu-Smith,’21 stated, “I think it’s important for us to stay active and participate in everything we can that brings us closer to saving our Earth. A lot of times, people think that marches, protests, rallies, and etc don’t make a change, but that isn’t true. This is a small step towards reaching the larger goal.”

Ms. Boyle, social science teacher, noted “It’s amazing to see students taking initiative in order to save the Earth. Students now will be the ones that will be in charge of the world pretty soon, which is a hue task in and of itself, but would be even harder if there was no hope left for the Earth which, luckily there still is.”

More and more students across the country are taking action in order to push legislation that will help save the Earth. This is a trend that needs to continue, because the climate is changing, and so should society.