Voice Your Opinions, Act Now: Honors Bio Tackles Global Warming

Britta Wolker, Journalist

As ninth grade honors bio begin their new semester, they explore more than just the science of life and living things. In this new unit, they are focusing on implementing their own concepts and opinions on bettering the earth’s global warming and ozone depletion crisis. It goes beyond just memorizing and understanding the subject, but also realizing the significance of voicing questions and ideas. Why is this so important? Listening to the opinions of others and expressing one’s own opinions is a way to take action by communicating and interacting with others on what might be a future solution to one of the world’s many flaws.

Currently, students are studying the greenhouse effect and how excess amount of greenhouse gases (primarily CO2, methane, and nitrous oxide and ozone) that trap heat are absorbing infrared radiation in the atmosphere, causing the planet to heat up. Too much of these greenhouse gases cause more heat absorption than reflection. As humans continue to burn fossil fuels like coal and oil, they emit more CO2 into the atmosphere, which results in rising sea levels by melting glaciers and land ice, warm ocean waters causing ocean acidification, warming climates affecting animal habitats and agriculture, and other consequences. Not only that, but pollution through CFCs has also posed a threat to the ozone layer (a gas 15-35 km above Earth surface that surrounds the planet and absorbs 98% of damaging UV light). With these major global issues, Freshman Sia Vij thinks “There should be an urgent need to educate people about global warming before anything unfortunate happens. I believe we should address these problems as soon as possible because destruction has already come, and it’s only gonna get worse.”

Even a brief mention of these issues can help spread awareness and perhaps inspire others to open their minds’ to find ways that they too, can contribute to saving the planet. It can be as easy as considering carpooling, biking more than driving, recycling more, and unplugging chargers they’re not in use. Because at the end of the day, what we choose to put into our planet comes back to us in some kind of way.