The Great Salt Bay Environmental Club. (Johanna Neeson photo)
Althea Flogee, an eighth-grader at Great Salt Bay Community School in Damariscotta, was struck with the idea to start the Great Salt Bay Environmental Club after learning about the effects of climate change in Michael Stenstrom’s science classroom and watching the documentary “Before the Flood” with her mother.
Flogee stated that the movie “made her more aware of everything” surrounding man’s contribution to global warming and she “wanted to show the public their impact.” Shortly after, the environmental club was born, with the goal of educating the community about the realities of climate change and how every person has a part to play in protecting the environment.
President Carlos Canny and Vice President Ava Nery are among the 14 current members of the club that began early in 2018 and meets every Tuesday under Stenstrom’s faculty leadership. Canny notes that the club not only has to reach out and inform fellow GSB students but also adults in the community who are voting and impacting political change both locally and globally.
The Great Salt Bay Environmental Club, said Canny, aims to “show the adults in the community how global warming pertains to them and how they can change.” The club also hopes to share its message with younger children who will grow up in this changing world.
On Sunday, June 10, at 3 p.m., the club will host an open event with guest speaker Paul Andrew Mayewski. As a professor and director of the Climate Change Institute at the University of Maine in Orono, Mayewski has taken part in more than 55 research trips around the world to conduct research on human impact on climate change. His talk will cover topics such as new climate change research and tools, as well as the idea of “climate futures” as a method of projecting the climate realities of the future. All are welcome and encouraged to attend the free talk and discussion in the gymnasium of Great Salt Bay Community School, located at 559 Main St., Damariscotta.
The Great Salt Bay Environmental Club wants to focus specifically on raising awareness of the small actions that people can take toward supporting environmentally conscious organizations and lessening their personal contributions to global warming. Through the showing of the film “Before the Flood” on May 20 and the speaker’s talk on June 10, the club hopes to raise awareness and continue into the next school year with new goals, including putting up a bulletin board with a changing display of different environmental issues.
(Correction: An earlier version of this article online and on page 11 of the May 31 print edition incorrectly reported the date for a talk by Paul Andrew Mayewski.)
