Maine’s young eco-activists
High school students have been the driving force behind SolaRISE Portland. Photo courtesy of Gregg Ferguson.
This article was originally published in the 2020 SunriseGuide.
By Amy Paradysz
Young people are driving some of Maine’s biggest environmental movements, going beyond climate strikes and voter drives to enlist broader community, municipal, corporate and legislative support for projects with lasting impact.
Changemakers
For the past four years, Maine Environmental Education Association has hosted the Changemakers Gathering, connecting young eco-activists with mentors, training and resources. Mainers ages 15-30 apply to attend the free two-day Gathering at the University of Maine 4-H Camp and Learning Center at Tanglewood in Lincolnville in September as a launch pad for their own green initiatives. Thanks to a national award MEEA received from Underwriters Laboratory, alumni of the Gathering can now apply for seed grants for efforts in their local communities.
“It’s kind of a year-long cohort,” said 25-year-old Paige Nygaard, who leads civic engagement. “It’s incredible to see people come in and gain the confidence to take action. They give me a lot of hope.”
“It’s more than just empowering them, it’s giving them the tools to implement change in their communities,” said Program Manager Nyaruot Nguany, 27. “It’s so uplifting.”
Think of it as a two-day incubator, germinating community action projects throughout Maine.
For example, Changemaker Natalia Kempthorne-Curiel led fellow students at Washington Academy in East Machias to push the school to switch from single-use plastic to reusable utensils.
Changemaker Amara Ifeji, a senior at Bangor High School, hosted the Stormwater Management and Research Team (SMART) Summer Institute in 2019 and is filming a documentary highlighting experiences of minority women in STEM fields.
One of the most impactful student-led initiatives in Maine, SolaRISE Portland, was just an idea when a few Changemakers from Casco Bay High School attended the 2018 Gathering.
Maine Environmental Education Association gathers Changemakers ages 15-30 for two days every September.
SolaRISE Portland
“The Gathering motivated us to keep moving forward,” said Siri Pierce, a senior at Casco Bay High School. She was one of a half dozen students on the green team who began advocating in 2018 for rooftop solar arrays to offset the school’s carbon footprint.
The concept expanded to encompass the school district as a whole, with a larger group of students planning, fundraising and collaborating with city leaders on a citywide proposal. The students dubbed their collaboration SolaRISE and organized a march in May 2019 from City Hall to Deering Oaks Park with a series of speakers. Three hundred people came out in support of solarizing Portland schools.
“To get the School Board to take us seriously we needed to raise some money,” Pierce said. A local environmental initiative called Campaign Earth pitched in with fundraising and, with a crowdfunding campaign and local business donations, SolaRISE collected more than $20,000.
SolaRISE worked with city offficials, ReVision Energy and the Sierra Club of Maine throughout the summer of 2019 on a plan of action. Mid-summer the regulatory landscape changed — in favor of larger solar arrays.
“Gov. Janet Mills passed legislation that makes large solar array projects save quite a bit of money,” Pierce said. “So, now it’s more cost-effective to have an offsite solar array, and the City wants to combine the school project with the city project.”
By August, the School Board had voted unanimously in support of an offsite solar project anticipated to generate 2,500 kilowatts a year — offsetting an estimated 3,600 tons of carbon dioxide from the carbon footprint of the Portland Public Schools and saving the district $4 to 5.5 million over 20 years.
Clean Energy Schools
“It was Portland students who were driving SolaRISE, with adults who were mentoring and cheerleading them, including Sierra Club of Maine members,” said Anne D. (Andy) Burt, 74. “It was young people who pushed to make it district-wide. That’s the power of youth. They’re the prophetic voice, if you will, for our time, and they are asking adults to join in with them.”
Here in Maine, Burt is a lead volunteer with the Sierra Club’s Climate Parent and Clean Energy School initiatives, encouraging and supporting grassroots and student-led initiatives.
“We’re getting a lot of inquiries and interest on this and hope to support at least 10 school district initiatives,” Burt said.
Banking on the power of humor to broach conversations about the impacts of climate change, the Sierra Club of Maine hopes to offer seed grants for a couple of school districts that want to use a comedy café as a fundraiser for clean energy initiatives such as energy efficiency and weatherizing.
Maine Youth for Climate Justice
Completely youth-led, Maine Youth for Climate Justice demands climate justice on a timeline consistent with climate science and social justice. Maine Youth for Climate Justice partnered with Maine Youth Climate Strikes (the Maine branch of the teen-led US Youth Climate Strikes) and 350 Maine (the Maine branch of the national 350.org movement) to organize youth-led strikes across Maine in September 2019 as part of a week of global climate action.
Sunrise Movement
The worldwide Sunrise Movement is building an army of young people to make climate change an urgent priority across America. Maine has four hubs so far — a community hub in Portland and one hub each at Bowdoin College, Bates College and Unity College. The Portland hub is led by young people but open to everyone. This hub meets on first and third Wednesdays at 6:30 p.m. at Zero Station (222 Anderson St., Portland) and has a Facebook page called “Sunrise Maine.”
