The Earth Day fair acts as the finale of the week celebrating the planet we live on. The event took place on April 25 in the quad and featured many creative booths that gave students insight into how their actions affect climate change.

The booths varied between being purely educational, to arts and crafts booths that centered on recycling to make art projects.

The event also featured people from outside the high school who came to promote their own green businesses or research on climate change and what students can do to make a difference.

One educational booth discussed the pollutants put out by cars and the healthy impact of more eco-friendly versions such as electric cars. They also brought toy cars to illustrate their point.

Many others discussed the scientific implications of  pollutants. One, for example, discussed over-fishing and killing sharks for their fins.

Another booth, created by sophomores Chloe Buschow, Kristina Shea and Sebastian Pouw from Green for Green Club, centered around making paper out of old class assignments that they had no more use for. Their goal was to use it as a replacement for notebook paper to reduce the amount of waste they generated.

“We used a lot of our [class] assignments and various things that my parents shredded and you take it, shred it, soak it in water and you blend it and put it through a screen and you pull it out with a rolling pin,” Shea said.

She also advised that bleach could be added to make the paper an even brighter white color, although the paper they had on display was already a good shade.

The end product of the project was a small sheet of paper that resembled wood chips pressed together. Buschow mentioned that, while it wasn’t big enough to write on as notebook  paper, she utilized a smaller portion of it as a flashcard.

The club will be trying to make paper again, and would like for anyone interested to contact them for further detail such as time and place.

Another art booth invited students to turn old CDs into a decoration by drawing on them and hanging them up with discarded paper clips.

These kinds of crafts that encourage recycling by turning old, useless items into cute decorations are part of the message of the Earth Day fair: that everyone has a part in affecting the planet for the better.

Environmental Club was a big part of organizing the event. They not only had their own booths, but coordinated other booths such as the Green for Green club’s.

Along with president of the club, junior Maurina Zurnich, they created a Pledge Tree where students could write down ideas for what they could do or improve on in their daily lives to help positively affect the environment.

“It’s your eco-pledge saying that you’ll help reduce the waste of the environment and overall pollution,” Katelyn Britts, a junior and member of the Environmental Club, said.

To make a pledge, students wrote down their idea on a leaf and taped it to a poster with a painting of a tree that the club created. Making a leaf made the student eligible to enter a raffle.

“You just write down one thing you think you can do to that makes an impact. It can even be simple just to help the environment and you can put your name in a raffle and you can win a prize,” Zurnich said.

Prizes for the raffle include reusable water bottles, T-shirts and bags. Winners will be announced by Environmental Club within the next week.

The purpose of the Pledge Tree is to encourage everyone to do their part to help the environment.

“Every individual makes a difference, you know, collectively, even if its just one person,” Britts said.

Many students were inspired by this knowledge to strive to do their best to preserve our planet. Some pledged to use less water, while others promised to recycle their old classwork.

One Center student, Caroline Corley, was there as part of her senior culminating experience.

“It’s an environmental ecosystem website, she’s actually in a booth over there, and so she’s worked on making people more aware, she’s actually taking photos of this today to spread the word about how they can help the environment,” Britts said.

Earth Day is a celebration of our planet and what people all over the world can do to protect it.

The Earth Day fair taught students that everyone’s actions, even if they seem small, have an impact on the health of our planet.