Power Shift 2013

Campus Climate Challenge

WeArePowerShift.org Highlights

From our campuses to the White House, we're Taking Back Earth Day


Today is Earth Day, but this year the usual corporate greenwashing and symbolic gestures aren’t going to cut it. This year, we’re taking it back.

Students on dozens of campuses are organizing Take Back Earth Day events to demand their colleges and universities address the climate crisis with more than just words. At the same time, a movement-wide coalition is pushing on the national level by flooding the State Department with over 1 million public comments against the disastrous Keystone XL Pipeline.

#TakeBackEarthDay: Join the students taking action across the country by demanding the Obama Administration reject Keystone XL!

 

Whether it’s your administration on campus or the administration in Washington, we’ve got to hold our leaders accountable to their climate commitments, and push them to make a clean break from big polluters: divesting from fossil fuels and moving to 100% clean energy.

That’s what Earth Day needs to be about.

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How are you Taking Back Earth Day?

This Earth Day, on campuses across the country students are demanding their campuses take bold action on climate by divesting from fossil fuels and moving to clean energy.

Students and universities are leading the fight against climate change. Thanks to years of student organizing, over 700 campuses have committed to carbon neutrality or have made some kind of commitment around climate change.

Yet - campuses continue to support dirty energy that is fueling the climate crisis, and making people sick. Students must stand in solidarity with communities being impacted by climate change and dirty energy, and demand that our campuses clean up their act.

What will you do to Take Back Earth Day? Check out our new video and put your campus on the map!

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PHOTO ROUND-UP: National Victories Build Power To #DivestNow!

This has been a huge week of victories for divestment campaigns across the nation!  Students are turning up the heat and campaigns are reaching a tipping point as the semester builds toward Board of Trustee meetings in May.  They're showing their trustees the powerful bredth and depth of student, faculty, and alumni support for divestment.

Every day our movement has seen new victories as student governments and student bodies nationwide pass resolutions and referendums with overwhelming and at times unanimous support of divestment.  As our friends at Responsible Endowments Coalition say - Our Endowment, Our Responsibility, Our POWER!

 

 

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Taking Back Earth Day

Earth Day is around the corner, and this year we’re taking it back.

Earth Day was founded in 1970 to, in the words of its founder, “bring an overwhelming insistence of the new generation that we stem the tide of environmental disaster.” Now each year I see Earth Day come and go with too much greenwashing and not enough action.

This year, we want to try something a little different: we want to Take Back Earth Day by organizing bold actions on our campuses.

Already students are organizing incredible Earth Day actions — from hundreds of students at Mizzou who will rally to demand their school shut down its dirty coal plant, to high schoolers from across Minnesota who will unite to lead a March to Demand Climate Action.

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The fossil fuel industry doesn't rest in the summer — so neither can we

As I watched the snow fall outside my window yesterday, it was hard to believe that summer is right around the corner. But you better believe that it’s coming, and the time to figure out your summer plans is NOW!

Summer is a critical time to build and strengthen the movement, and luckily there are tons of opportunities to get involved in the youth climate movement this summer!

Check out our Summer Opportunities page to find out what’s going on across the movement! Many application deadlines are approaching soon!

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Reflections & Experiences of our Fellowship

Power Shift 2013 is coming to Pittsburgh!

Photo Credit: Shadia Fayne Wood

Let’s skip right to the big news: Power. Shift. 2013.

This October 18-21 over 10,000 of us will come together in Pittsburgh, PA for Power Shift 2013, the largest and most powerful convergence in the history of the youth climate movement.

Are you as excited as we are? Let us know and be the first to get updates about Power Shift 2013!

In the past year, our movement has made incredible progress fighting Keystone XL, shutting down the coal industry, scaling up renewables, and building a movement to see this work through.

Power Shift 2013 is our opportunity to come together and shift our country ENTIRELY AWAY from fossil fuels and TOWARD local clean energy solutions.

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We Marched Forth on #March4th for Climate Justice #DivestNow

On dozens of campuses across the country yesterday, students Marched Forth on March 4th with marches and rallies demanding our universities divest now!

Flaunting the orange square, we showed our growing power with escalated pressure on our university presidents and boards.   We proclaimed "Divestment is a Tactic; Justice is the Goal" and connected our movement with the larger struggle for economic and climate justice. 

Yesterday, we showed how our national momentum from February's Power Up! Student Convergence can translate to taking action on our campuses in solidarity with one another.  Together, we are unstoppable!

Check out the national photo roundup after the jump!

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PHOTOS: #ForwardOnClimate - The Largest Climate Rally in US History

Yesterday was truly incredible — starting with the inspring Youth Convergence where 500+ young people gathered to continue building this movement and talk about the incredible work students are doing to push their colleges to divest from fossil fuels and move to 100% clean energy — and ending with the 50,000 strong #ForwardOnClimate rally, the largest rally in US history calling for climate action!

We’d love to hear from those of you who were at the rally or the convergence, so please share your experience on the blog! In the meantime, we wanted to share some of our favorite photos of the day.


500+ young people gather before the #ForwardOnClimate rally — Photo Credit: Energy Action Coalition

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Arrested, but not stopping

This morning I was arrested in front of the White House.

I sat down and got arrested to show that we are determined to see President Obama take decisive action on climate change by rejecting the Keystone XL pipeline.

As one of the youth leaders participating in this demonstration, today I stood for our generation.

Never before have the stakes been higher to take action on climate change. In 2012, extreme weather events took a harrowing toll on people across the United States and the world. If we fail to take action, millions of people around the world will suffer. There simply is not an option to sit on the sidelines and let this moment pass.

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