Collingwood teens are planning a strike action this Friday to call for a unified front on dealing with climate change.
Reneé Fico is a member of the Gaia environmentalist group at Collingwood Collegiate Institute (CCI) and one of the organizers of the rally planned at town hall.
Fico said the plan is to walk out of school at noon and walk down Hurontario Street to town hall where she hopes students will be joined by adults.
“Youth empowerment and leadership is important, but unity between generations is also important in this time,” said Fico.
She’ll be delivering a speech, and she plans to quote 16-year-old climate change activist Greta Thunberg.
“We need to show that Canadians, especially young Canadians are serious about what’s happening around the world,” said Fico. “We need to take it more seriously and the community needs to see that.”
On Friday, Sept. 20, Fico and about 20 to 30 students walked out for fourth period and held some signs up from the sidewalk on Hurontario Street. They also worked on painting signs for the Sept. 27 Global Climate Strike action.
She’s been visiting local businesses to hand out signs for the strike and having lots of one-on-one conversations with fellow students. Fico also visited area elementary schools to tell them about the strike.
She said she’s hoping for a minimum of 100 people at the strike, but is hoping the entire student population of CCI will walk out with her.
“If you look at what others are doing with their action and leading by example, why wouldn’t we do that, because it’s working,” said Fico, adding she just “couldn’t not strike” after hearing Thurnberg speak on environmental destruction.
“These are environmental consequences we’ve had control over, but we’ve been unable to act on,” said Fico.
She said she and the students who join her will be calling for mass tree planting, and they’ll be encouraging adults who can vote to do so with the environment in mind.
“We need to stop electing leaders based on them making fun of each other and bashing each other,” she said.
The Global Climate Strike is an international movement encouraging people, especially youth, to take strike action and call on governments to respond to the climate crisis and put an end to burning fossil fuels. According to globalclimatestrike.net, there are world-wide strikes planned in 150 countries for Sept. 20 and 27.
