Earth Day exists as a reminder to protect our planet. There are many ways to contribute to this annual holiday, and to daily life, but the biggest and most known one is to: reduce, reuse and recycle.
“Barstow needs to recycle more, just gonna start there. We could do a better job making students and faculty aware of what is recyclable and encourage them to recycle more frequently. I would like to make it a permanent celebration at school so we continue to spread awareness and share how to contribute to helping the environment,” says Ms. Garrels, a Middle and Upper School science teacher.
Earth Day celebrates the anniversary of an environmental movement that started in 1970. In January of 1969, there was a huge oil spill in California that sparked Wisconsin junior senator Gaylord Nelson to spread awareness of air and water pollution.
Nelson was inspired by the Anti-Vietnam War teach-ins happening at various colleges, and he decided to do one for his protest against environmental degradation. Teach-ins were informal lectures.
Along with Senator Nelson, Congressman Pete McCloskey and student president and activist Denis Hayes organized a teach-in on a college campus. They called the protest ‘Earth Day’ which then spread across the country and gained national attention. Thousands of universities and colleges joined together in protesting for the environment.
“The wire services carried the story from coast to coast. The response was electric. It took off like gangbusters. Telegrams, letters, and telephone inquiries poured in from all across the country. The American people finally had a forum to express their concern about what was happening to the land, rivers, lakes, and air—and they did so with spectacular exuberance,” recounted Nelson about the first Earth Day.
After the impact of the first Earth Day, there was more federal acknowledgment of the state of the environment. By the end of 1970, three new laws were passed which were the National Environmental Education Act to improve environmental awareness, the Occupational Safety and Health Act to promote clean work environments away from toxic chemicals, and the Clean Air Act which helps improve air quality and protect the ozone layer. In the same year, the United States Environmental Protection Agency was created. Additionally, acts protecting endangered species and regulating the use of chemicals were passed in the following years.
In 1990, Earth Day went global. Hayes organized another major campaign for Earth Day that 200 million people and 141 countries participated in. This immense international effort to become more environmentally friendly eventually led to the United Nations Earth Summit in 1992. In Rio de Janeiro, the Earth Summit was to create an agenda to encourage international cooperation to help the environmental issues. The Earth Summit was to prove that sustainable development can happen for everyone and that economic, social, and environmental issues are all key to supporting human life.
Today, around 1 billion people are involved in Earth Day. This year will mark the 52nd year of Earth Day. The theme for this year is “Invest In Our Planet,” which encourages governments, businesses, and individuals to start investing in a better future for the planet.
There are many subthemes for this year as well, one of which is about sustainable fashion. Earthday.org has created a petition to try and get the fashion industry to change and stop pointless waste. Some other focuses of this year’s initiative are investing in cleaner forms of energy, such as wind, solar, and water powers, and taking conscious steps on the corporate and individual scale to minimize waste, air pollution, and plastic.
It is not easy to change every habit to help save the Earth, but every small action matters. Small things like turning off the lights when leaving a room and turning off the water when washing the dishes can both save money and help the environment.
