My Story
Ever since I was young, I have watched my community's pond change from my family's favorite place to hike around to a dirty, polluted swamp. What once used to be clear, blue water inhabited by many fish, has turned into the dark remnants of pollution and poisoned animals.There have been piles of litter growing in my community's forests and sidewalks as many people have become increasingly more careless with properly discarding trash. Especially after a large clubhouse fire in my neighborhood, due to a community member's irresponsibility of littering a burning cigarette on the ground near the trash can, our community has been falling apart. It is important to bring the people in my community back together.
Even without a community clubhouse, I want to be able to unite many younger students to join an active movement to build back our community. Because there have already been many efforts to educate adults, it is important to educate younger students in a fun, but effective way. As children are taught properly about preserving the environment, this will influence their parents and many other adults as well. By creating a healthy environment in our community, the active movement to save the environment can eventually grow to an entire district, and even the whole region of young environmental activists.
My Project
Students will be getting more involved with our community's environmental protection organizations. After gathering high school students to establish a club, we will be going to different elementary and middle schools to discuss involving younger students to use their talents in STEM, Arts, and Writing (S.T.E.A.M.)to promote environmental awareness. I believe strongly that by creating a "student-section" in our community environmental organizations like CleanFairfax, students can add their own research papers, essays, poems, short stories, music, questions, and even art into the organization's website or newspaper. This would influence many girls to both share their talents with the community and even put efforts into saving the environment. Girls will feel less afraid to express their passion for STEM through posting their work to CleanFairfax.
Update
Rachel updated her project due to COVID-19. She worked with another ambassador, Kelly Cha, to create an online mentoring program for middle school girls. The girls each worked on their own projects, and they created The STEAMER Girls Magazine to showcase their efforts.