Nine Oahu high school students graduated last month from the Climate Crew, an educational program for high school students rooted in climate science and data-driven advocacy.

Founded in November 2019, Climate Crew is an initiative under the Blue Planet Foundation, a local nonprofit organization dedicated to working toward Hawaii running on 100% renewable energy. The program “aims to empower youth across Hawaii to more fully engage in advocacy activities,” to put necessary policy changes related to clean energy and climate measures into action.

The program has partnered with the City and County of Honolulu, allowing members of the Climate Crew to engage in advocacy work in their communities directly. Members of the cohort conducted various “Climate Actions” — advocacy or civic engagement activities that positively affect the local community — like speaking at neighborhood board meetings and organizing social media campaigns.

“An important piece of the program is providing the members with the tools and confidence to reach out to their state and local representatives,” said Griff Jurgens, educational director of the Blue Planet Foundation. “This cohort was able to connect with around five representatives to present to, talk story and propose policy that they wanted to see passed.”

The program’s 2021 group of students, known as Cohort III, completed 35 Climate Actions and gave 11 community presentations throughout the eight-month program, despite the majority of the program’s events and meetings taking place online.

According to Kaelah Kimura, a rising junior at Punahou School, the cohort “didn’t get a whole lot of chances to get to know one another,” meeting up only about once a month to discuss the progress they were making on their individual Climate Actions, and more frequently when working on group actions.

“The pandemic … made the Crew members get creative with their Climate Actions and how they engaged the community,” Jurgens said. “In the past, they could create meet-ups and events that brought people together to spread awareness about new policy that would make a difference. Now, they utilized digital resources to create virtual events, like an island-wide visual art contest or social media campaigns.”

Reign La France, who graduated with Cohort III, said that with the Blue Planet Foundation, she felt like she was “actually making a difference.”

“I was always someone who was interested in advocating and fighting against climate change but never really knew where to begin,” said La France, a recent Kalani High School graduate.

La France’s main Climate Action was the creation of an online art gallery and contest intended to spread awareness of climate change. The contest, which took place in March, was funded by the Blue Planet Foundation and received around 40 submissions.

“The whole idea was through the (saying), ‘A picture is worth a thousand words,’ and knowing the majority of our audience would be teenagers or young adults, we wanted to do something that was eye-catching and fun to look at but also had the emotional aspect to it to make it even more exciting,” La France said.

The cohort’s Climate Actions took a variety of forms. Leila Hirayama, a recent McKinley High School graduate, started a sustainability poster contest at her school that attracted 27 entries. She is now working with her school to print the posters and display them in the school’s main hallway.

“I think it was really successful,” Hirayama said. “It was great to see what issues people chose and how they chose to spread awareness or represent (the issue) through their posters.”

Adam Ancheta, a junior at Mid-Pacific Institute, said the Climate Action he was most proud of was a policy package submitted to the state Legislature.

“I think policy is one of the biggest ways we can make change in the community, and I just felt like (the package) might have an impact on how the Legislature deals with this issue going forward,” Ancheta said.

According to Jurgens, it was “amazing to see what an impact nine high school students from Hawaii can have on their communities and beyond.”

“The youth today have so much on their plate, and for these nine individuals to take on this kind of challenge speaks volumes. It showed their true character, work ethic and love for their communities,” Jurgens said.

For Kimura the importance of youth making tangible action in the current moment was a significant lesson throughout her experience with the Climate Crew.

“At school you’re learning a lot of things to help you implement projects later on, but the thing I liked about Climate Crew was the stress on doing things now, in our youth, and how being young gives us a unique voice that needs to be heard,” Kimura said. “I think that was the most impactful part for me: understanding that because we are in high school, we have something to share.”