Climate Summer Initiative draws on community to rally for change

Author: Aylie Baker

"If you could say something to the Earth, what would it be?"

For an onlooker standing in downtown Concord, N.H. on Aug. 4 this past summer, the answer would have been quite obvious. Indeed, the colorful tide of silk streamers emblazoned with missives - here a stanza from Walt Whitman, there an apology, behind perhaps a chorus of Joni Mitchell wound about a celebration, a promise - may have been overwhelming.

"There was definitely something spiritual about it," recalled Becca Wear '10.5, one of 18 Middlebury students who took part in organizing an August march across New Hampshire as a culmination of "Climate Summer." Streamers waving, citizens braved the heat to raise a cry to reduce carbon emissions 80 percent by 2050. Yet the march across New Hampshire from August 1-4 was much more than a rallying trek.

As Bonnie Hemphill-Fry '08 said, it was "a pilgrimage," a case of "bringing movement to the movement, democracy in action and [of course] shaking up the system." Over the course of four days, the highways of New Hampshire swelled as tributaries of a vibrant community coalesced - farmers, teachers, artists, politicians, religious leaders, old and young.

This was "Climate Summer" as it was envisioned some six months before by 25 student environmental activists - a multifaceted, community-based grassroots movement which was multilateral - "of course environmental, but also social, economical, about energy," said Hemphill-Fry. Whether riding bedecked in "red, white and green" on a carbon-neutral float in a Fourth of July Parade, carrying a wheelchair-ridden woman three miles in the sweltering heat or simply lining up to wash dishes after a fourteen-hour day, these students lived the movement.

The overwhelming passion and scope of "Climate Summer" in many ways invokes powerful memories of the famous Freedom Summer of '64, which, for Bill McKibben, environmental journalist and author-in-residence, stands as a defining moment in the Civil Rights Movement. Granted, this time round, "the worst people were going to face was getting sunburned - not shot or put in prison," according to McKibben, but nevertheless, "there was the same kind of idealism, dedication, and hard work" pulsing in New Hampshire this past summer.

Students were not searching for converts as much as they were attempting to harness the rumblings of an environmental movement already underway across New Hampshire. Sierra Murdoch '09 could not stress enough their drive to "draw upon the resources already within [the state], to draw upon the New Hampshire culture."

"There was this huge sense that we were the thread that pulled it together," said Wear.

Thus, in addition to networking through the Sierra Club and joining forces with existing organizations such as the Carbon Coalition, students undertook a whole host of community-based initiatives. And so "Climate Summer" took shape as a multi-pronged, broad-based initiative. The 25 students divided themselves into different groups, aligned along both geographical and interest focuses.

Leading one such initiative was Hemphill-Fry, who, working almost entirely through e-mail, managed to rally 175 hikers to partake in "Climb it for Climate." It was a "flash-in-the-pan type deal," explained Fry of her event. On July 14, hikers across the country assembled to climb the Presidential summits and hike two traverses where they flew banners urging the reduction of carbon emissions.

"We covered 1000 miles of trail, and gained a total of 5000 feet of elevation - that measures up to 17.5 Mt. Everests!" said Hemphill-Fry.

Other students focused on projects involving theatre, local foods, art (as in Wear's Case), community rallies and various media exposure. By the time the march (organized largely by Murdoch) began in early August, all fronts seemed to be coming together.

"It was a massive community effort to get everyone on the same page every single day," admited Hemphill-Fry, "[but] honestly I don't know if I'll ever be part of a group of people who worked so well together."

Truth be told, there was no coincidence that "Climate Summer" was based in New Hampshire. With presidential elections looming on the horizon, New Hampshire was an obvious choice to host such a movement as "Climate Summer." Yet students had limited interaction with politicians over the summer months. Instead, by rousing the New Hampshire community, students were invoking an indirect political action, explained Hemphill-Fry, forcing the question, "Are you going to respond to your constituency?"

While the days of summer are slowly ebbing, the initiatives drawn up by the students behind Climate Summer are only increasing. There are unprecedented numbers of climate conferences this fall and the handful of students returning to campus are continuing to work diligently on Focus the Nation and carbon neutrality initiatives. Yet these students are also intent on rallying students to the cause by challenging misperceptions about environmentalism, explained Wear.

"What does an environmentalist look like?" She asked. Not just the croc-donning granola she insisted. "Everyone can embody it."

Beyond Middlebury, the march continues. Many of the students involved in "Climate Summer" have set up base in Manchester in preparation for Step it up II on November 3 (marking the one year race to elections in 2008).

"We hope that we can invite every senator, every representative to come meet with their constituents," expressed McKibben. "Every state to talk about climate change." Step It Up II, while reiterating similar goals of "Climate Summer" shall take a more political stance as participants will travel to landmarks across the country to pay homage to leaders of the past. By uniting on "Mount Washington, Mount Abe, the birth place of Rachel Carson Ö Mount Rushmore in South Dakota," explained McKibben, Americans can "inspire some of these politicians to stop being politicians and become leaders for a while."