More than a dozen Michigan communities have scheduled events for Friday’s worldwide push for action on climate change. In Kalamazoo, organizers have been planning their program for months.
Climate change activism is not a new thing in Kalamazoo. But recently it’s been gaining momentum. While last March’s climate strikewas a relatively brief affair on Western Michigan University’s campus, this one includes a rally at Western, a march to downtown, and a three-hour event at the Arcadia Creek Festival place with an extensive speaker list.
Students from at least three high schools and one grade school are among those scheduled to talk. High school students played a central rolein planning the events on Friday.
Basma Hegazy is a senior at Portage Northern High School. She said she’s already been a climate activist for a couple of years, working with groups like the Sunrise Movement. Hegazy says she used to live in Egypt and New York, and she became concerned after going back to visit.
“The air felt different,” she said. “It felt thick there in downtown, same thing in New York and I think that was the turning point – ‘we have to do something, this isn’t normal.’”
Hegazy plans to lead a walk-out at her school Friday morning.
Western Michigan University first-year Esther Chan also plans to march. Forest fires and deliberate burnsin Indonesia have contributed to an air quality crisis in Malaysia, her home country.
“A lot of people are suffering, like personally, my mother she has asthma and she’s having a lot of problems breathing and everyone there is just sick,” she said.
“I think we should stop burning and do everything we can to save the earth,” she added.
Organizers were pleased with the turnout at a sign-making party last week.
Kalamazoo College biology student Fiona Summers' poster read, in part, “Yo mama’s so hot she’s about to experience rising sea levels.”
Beyond marching, Summers says people worried about the climate need to vote.
“We don’t want another president that refuses to believe that climate change is real and fill his whole cabinet with people that also don’t believe that,” she said.
Climate strikes are also planned Friday in Marshall and Allegan.
WMUK reporter Ben Gretchko contributed to this story.
