Please join local students (Charlottesville Area and UVA) for the Climate Strike being held this Friday, Sept. 20, at noon at the Free Speech Wall on the Downtown Mall. In addition, a march down Main Street to the Mall is planned by UVA students (under the auspices of the Virginia Student Environmental Coalition) starting at 10:30 at the Rotunda. University professors and student protesters will speak on the climate crisis before the march proceeds. In the words of the event organizers “For over a year, millions of students across the globe have been ‘striking’ by leaving their classrooms every Friday to call attention to how the climate crisis is devastating homes, land, and communities…Young people refuse to sit by as our future is destroyed around us. Ahead of the UN Global Climate Summit on Sept. 20th, young people and adults will be striking with a shared platform of demands in the U.S. to call attention to the issue and to build momentum for these demands to be met.”
Included in these demands are actions to protect and restore biodiversity, to promote environmental justice for marginalized communities, to respect indigenous lands and sovereignty, to implement sustainable agriculture, and to promote a “Green New Deal” for U.S. citizens. The event is explicitly geared towards bringing together the different generations of environmental activists and concerned citizens to demand strong action addressing climate change, and is sponsored by a wide range of environmental and religious organizations. Local efforts are being led by the Virginia Student Environmental Coalition and 12-year-old climate activist Gundrun Campbell.
