You can start by registering your action here. If you register, we can send you tabling materials such as buttons and stickers. UPDATE: We just added a MEDIA GUIDE with templates for your events!
Why take action for Earth Day?
When Earth Day began in 1970 it was about challenging the powers that be and launching a HUGE, largely youth-driven, movement to bring issues of environmental devastation to the forefront of public opinion. Students on thousands of campuses across the country mobilized and demanded their leaders step up and address the looming environmental crisis. This year, we have the same opportunity and it is our turn to take action for the clean energy solutions we need to safeguard the climate.
Here are 3 easy ways to use your Earth Day events to make a difference:
1. Challenge your school's administration to make the clean energy changes you're asking for! Collect petition signatures and invite the media to your event. Make it clear what you're working towards with tons of signs announcing "We can do it!" - with the administration's help. You can download the Sierra Club's Rosie the Riveter posters here and supplement them with signs about efficiency, green buildings, electric vehicles or whatever else you're asking for.
2. Pressure your public officials to implement solutions with photo petitions supporting 80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050, no coal and new investments in green collar jobs! Write the asks on word bubbles and take photos of students holding them up, then send them in to state and federal leaders! 3. Host a round table with dozens of diverse student organizations to share plans for next year and discuss ways to work together. Ask all the groups to commit to participate in Power Shift '08 (an effort to collect 1 million youth pledges for climate action in the election season and beyond) and get your student newspaper, radio and TV stations to cover it.
****Also check out this sweet guide to getting all your efforts covered by campus and local MEDIA!!
We haven't started yet. Where do we begin?
You can incorporate the above actions into just about any big event you do on campus. For more ideas, check out the Sierra Club's Earth Day HQ here.
Earth Day is great, but what's next?
Call everyone who signed your petition or came to an event to say thanks and invite them to get more involved by coming to your next event or a SPROG! As finals near, people will be looking for fun and low key study break events that can keep building momentum for your campaign. Try These!
-Throw a "Do it in the Dark" or "Save the Ales" Party to relax and have fun during this stressful time, we have an easy-to-use guide here.
-Set up a fair trade, organic coffee stand right in the middle of campus and give away free cups of coffee to people who have their own mug (and charge everyone else 50 cents to get a cup). The catch is to make sure they sign your petition first, or ask them record a 10 sec video about why they feel it's important to stop global warming. You can deliver the videos to your President or other public officials!
-Host a "midnight" breakfast and vigil for the climate outside the President's office. Serve pancakes and coffee while students share their vision of a climate-stable world. Since your administrators probably won't be in their offices that late, be sure to get the campus paper out to cover it and consider leaving hand written notes on the door step for the President to find in the morning.
-And, don't forget to register for the SSC's week-long summer training programs, or SPROGs! These trainings, at state parks, include awesome student-led organizing skills trainings along with hiking, campfires and the opportunity to make many, many new friends. Check them out and register here: www.ssc.org/sprog
