Area teens taking leading role in climate change advocacy effort

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Okemos High School student Bernadette Osborn talks about recent projects Climate Reality Lansing did and actions she hopes Michigan residents take regarding climate change. Okemos students have taken a leading role in Climate Reality Lansing’s efforts.

An environmental advocacy group is engaging area teens in the effort to address climate change.

Climate Reality Lansing was founded in August 2020 by Carolyn Randall, owner of Randall & Associates Publishing, who chairs the group, and Okemos High School senior Bernadette Osborn, who serves as vice chair. In August, group members helped lobby to keep climate protection providers in the bipartisan infrastructure bill that passed Congress. They group also is lobbying for carbon pricing.

“I’m just really happy that it’s a youth active group because I think, you know, it’s young people that really need to take charge of this issue since it’s their future that’s going to be most impacted by climate change,” Randall said. 

This group seeks to meet with state elected leaders to talk about climate issue and presents educational seminars to teach the community about climate change. 

Randall said the group is heavily run by Okemos High School students. She advises them on how to lobby and campaign to become influential leaders. 

She said the group’s greatest impact on Michigan is its ability to talk with members of Congress and increase public awareness on climate change locally and statewide.

Osborn creates bi-weekly webinars for Climate Reality Lansing and present to local schools to educate people on environmental topics like water pollution and climate change. She also organizes campaigns and handles networking for the group. She said the group’s goals are building an active membership and growing its campaigns. 

“Keeping an active membership is hard because a lot of people do get bored,” Osborn said. “So we have to always make sure that we are producing campaigns and giving them jobs they’ll want to do.”

She said one of the group’s main challenges is getting legislation passed.

“A lot of the senators and representatives that we speak to, we usually speak to their staff,” Osborn said. They can’t directly say what the senator or representative is thinking so it’s a little hard getting through there. It’s hard, but we’re working on it.” 

Okemos High junior Arohi Nair, who serves as the marketing chair, said Climate Reality Lansing is paving the way for environmental advocacy in Michigan. 

“Climate Reality is a big organization, which is why there are chapters,” Nair said. “The big organization of Climate Reality, I think it’s pretty evident that they’ve done a lot of activism and caused great changes to come about, and so by creating this chapter, Bernadette, our president, has really been able to target the local level and by focusing on the small scale of Lansing that really helps with climate justice in our community.”  

Nair said being a student-run organization is hard because some people disbelieve what young people say and reaching out to older generations is a continuous struggle. 

Nair said she hopes the local residents see their group as an educational experience and to tackle climate change. She adds they are able to make a difference by discussing environmental topics and pushing for change. 

“Although there is some stuff we can do on an individual level, systematic change is very important,” Nair said.

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