Hi All,
All schools in Sonoma County and many in Lake and Mendocino counties are closed today due to poor air quality from smoke from the climate-related wildfires in Butte County today. Our thoughts and prayers go out to those affected and those responding to this disaster.
In the past 13 months kids in Sonoma County and elsewhere in Northern California have had more than a month of hazy, unhealthy skies due to climate-related fires. The haze makes it clear that our nation has a moral imperative to act on climate change. The haze makes it clear that educational leaders, who focus on the well-being and future success of young people, do not have to be silent witnesses to our national climate neglect which so directly threatens young people.
Kristan, Lola, and June were already planning to skip school today anyhow to speak at open comment period at the State Board of Education. Since our schools are closed, Kai and I will be joining them. We will be asking the CA State Board of Education to join 27 other school boards in CA, CO, NY, and VA and the Credo Student Council and pass a non-partisan climate action resolution building political and public will for national climate action to protect young people and future generations. We will be sharing information about the climate action resolution the National School Boards Association will consider in committee in March, 2019.
If you would like to help amplify this appeal, please consider following our Twitter feed today and retweeting and liking our tweets. We'll include the State Board of Education in our twitter feed. Your retweets will help them see broader support (than just one family) for this effort to shift paradigms and get the ed sector speaking up together.
Even in California, the dominant social norm among educational leaders is silence about climate justice. It is well within the power of the people receiving this email to quickly flip this social norm.
Our Twitter handle is @schools4climate.
Thanks so much!
Here is Youtube Video of my statement in September:
https://youtu.be/uHpH63PsXKs
(5:10:46)
Thanks all!
Cheers,
Park