Student Activism in the Philadelphia School District

Science teacher Brian O'Neil helps eighth grader Roy Bowser both in the classroom and out on a school garden project with Earth Force. Bowser is the head of the student group who has cleaned up a dump outside their school and is replacing it with a garden. He is also filming the project to create a multimedia production about their work.

Four years ago students at Lincoln High School organized a recycling program at their school. Now they recycle almost everything at their school and support recycling throughout their neighborhood. �This is the only program like it in the city,� said Judy Eastburn, an environmental science teacher at Lincoln and the school�s contact with the non-profit organization Earth Force. �Our students did a study and found out that about 85 percent of the school�s trash is recycleable.� Eastburn is one of many teachers in the city who has made a connection with Earth Force at one of its 20 partner schools in the District. The organization recruits educators at all levels to teach their students about environmental issues, community problems and how young people can help to solve them. �We�re trying to cultivate students who think like scientists and act like citizens,� said Colleen Contristiane, Delaware Region Program Director for Earth Force. The organization supports students in identifying problems in their communities and then figuring out how to solve them. Their projects include everything from school beautification, community gardens, park clean ups and recycling programs. At Grover Washington Middle School teachers who used curriculum from Earth Force took their students on a walk around their school to identify where they could make it better. Students quickly began thinking about how they could clean up a dump site that was on the main street in front of their school. Since then, they cleaned up the dump, cleared the land and have made way for the building of a garden with various local species of plants and have engaged in research about local ecology. �This is not just a project, its about giving back to the school,� said eighth grader Roy Bowser who is the student head of the project. �The school looks great, but the entrance was messed up.� The students are doing all of the gardening themselves, including putting up a tressel for roses some of them found hidden behind the school. At North East High School a group of over 50 students are engaged in a campaign to improve the recycling program at their school. The administration helped by putting bins in the classrooms, but its been all up to the studetns to educate their peers on why they should use them. This has included skits on the morning announcements and incentive programs such as students being entered in raffles if they�re caught recycling. Students at Franklin High School realized they needed to deal with littering at their school before they could push for recycling. �The easist thing has proved to be changing the environment, but the hardest is changing student�s attitudes and improving school pride,� said Contristiane about what the group at Franklin has learned. Earth Force finds teachers through various networks and trains them in the CAPS curriculum designed to bring environmental learning and activism into what educators are already teaching. Then, they train them and offer support from helping find contacts and giving advice on projects to coming to the school to help coach students and teachers. �The students really learn their skills from their motivated, passionate teachers who know how to organize,� said Contristiane. Earth Force also provides specific skill building workshops, such as public speaking. �We try to get [the students] talking better, help them stay organized themselves and doing their own action plans, said Contristiane. �We push the youth voice a lot, and follow what they want.�