Global warming is the long-term heating of Earth’s climate system, observed since pre-industrial times. It is due to human activities, primarily fossil fuel burning, which increases heat-trapping greenhouse gas levels in Earth’s atmosphere. Not a lot of people know the difference between global warming and climate change. They believe they both are the same thing, just a different word. Global warming refers only to the Earth’s rising surface temperature, while climate change includes warming and the “side effects” of warming—like melting glaciers, heavier rainstorms, or more frequent drought. 

 While a lot of people are aware of global warming, they mostly still are using cars or burning fossil fuels, or don’t even care about it. They usually convince themselves that other people are doing it too, companies are hurting the environment more, and their actions won’t change anything. For example, C.H.S. does not have recycling! Interesting right? While our school has a bunch of recycling bins all over they do not actually recycle what is in those bins. Everything goes straight to the regular trash can. Schools are the places that use the most paper. As of right now, pandemic and virtual learning help to prevent waste of paper and reduce CO2 since school busses aren’t running. But when everyone gets back to school, everything is going to be back to what it was. C.H.S. needs to be more aware of paper usage as we see virtual learning students didn’t use as much as they used to do. Students can ride and walk to school to keep the air fresh and clean. 

Not only the schools but the government needs to take action toward this. They should have laws and regulations to help the environment. As CHS student Ari Milstein mentioned: “I think that it’s ignorant to place the blame [of global warming] on the working class. Over 70% of the world’s pollution is caused by just 100 corporations. We the people can barely do anything to prevent it. If everyone in the world used reusable tools, public transportation, and threw their trash in a dumpster, we would barely see a difference. Our recycling goes right into the dump. That is just a cheap trick the government uses to make you think you’re accountable.”

Global warming is driven by human emissions of greenhouse gases, and the resulting large-scale shifts in weather patterns and climate change are side effects of the warming. There are a few ways that people can reduce the growth of global warming. A recent survey from CHS students found that students do a number of things to counter climate change such as using their own reusable bags and more energy-saving tools such as solar systems. They also try other environmentally friendly alternatives such as finding eco-friendly brands to reduce waste products and using less non-renewable things, stopping support of fast fashion, and reducing water waste. 

These are all actions they take outside of the school, but once we go to school there should be awareness/signs all over the school until they bring this change. Recycling does matter and CHS can do something about this. Students can also help the environment by riding bikes to school/walk, and schools can start using reusable plates for lunches instead of paper. Teachers can still give work on the computer instead of printing pages. Some people are trying to reduce waste, while others never care about it. Recycling is a small step and everyone in the CHS community can do little things to take action.