Walking up to Garfield High School in Seattle last week, I was greeted by at least 10 welcoming students. I was there attending the "Listening Session" for the Great Outdoor Initiative, one of the stops in this countrywide tour by the Department of the Interior.
Talking to folks before the introduction began I was delighted to hear about the youth summit earlier that day. The highlights for me in the introductory remarks were the Native American blessing given by a local tribe (including a very articulate princess!) and the hilarious welcoming speech by an Garfield senior.
It felt a little different than the typical public hearing. And there was a great diversity of people there from old to young, dark to light. Nice to see our natural world has a good looking fan base.
The high school auditorium was filled with a few hundred conservation supporters, government officials of all levels, environmental groups and I don't know who else. We were divided into groups according to numbers on our name tags and that's when I exited stage left. I just wanted to see if this was going to be anything different. I'd love to hear how those break out groups went, I was just glad to see the introduction and hear some great positive news out of the mouths of high school students.
You can participate by sharing your ideas, commenting on other peoples, promoting and demoting causes online at the Idea Jam:
http://ideas.usda.gov/ago/ideas.nsf/
Yes, there's some trash-talk going on as well. But at least it's refreshing to see real conservation issues being discussed at this level. I see no word how long this site is going to be up but I would imagine until the end of August. The first report by the Initiative is due November 15.
Comments can be emailed to: ago@ios.doi.gov.
Or go analog and submit by hand: Department of the Interior, America's Great Outdoors, 1849 C Street NW, Mailstop 3156, Washington DC 20240.
Talking to folks before the introduction began I was delighted to hear about the youth summit earlier that day. The highlights for me in the introductory remarks were the Native American blessing given by a local tribe (including a very articulate princess!) and the hilarious welcoming speech by an Garfield senior.
It felt a little different than the typical public hearing. And there was a great diversity of people there from old to young, dark to light. Nice to see our natural world has a good looking fan base.
The high school auditorium was filled with a few hundred conservation supporters, government officials of all levels, environmental groups and I don't know who else. We were divided into groups according to numbers on our name tags and that's when I exited stage left. I just wanted to see if this was going to be anything different. I'd love to hear how those break out groups went, I was just glad to see the introduction and hear some great positive news out of the mouths of high school students.
You can participate by sharing your ideas, commenting on other peoples, promoting and demoting causes online at the Idea Jam:
http://ideas.usda.gov/ago/ideas.nsf/
Yes, there's some trash-talk going on as well. But at least it's refreshing to see real conservation issues being discussed at this level. I see no word how long this site is going to be up but I would imagine until the end of August. The first report by the Initiative is due November 15.
Comments can be emailed to: ago@ios.doi.gov.
Or go analog and submit by hand: Department of the Interior, America's Great Outdoors, 1849 C Street NW, Mailstop 3156, Washington DC 20240.
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