Coming to a High School Near You...

It seems like everyday the news about the impacts of climate change worsens. But, there are some reasons to be optimistic right now. 22 million reasons to be exact.

There are 22 million young people, ages 14-19, in the U.S. and the Alliance for Climate Education (ACE) is a new nonprofit on the scene working to educate high school students about the science behind climate change, and empower them to take meaningful action against it.

Lower Your Emissions, Raise Your Voice
ACE firmly believes that high school students have a powerful role to play in reducing our carbon emissions and raising our united voice for a cleaner, brighter future.

And to that end, we're working hard to let high school students around the country know that young people are old enough to take bold, powerful action on the issue of climate change and bring about lasting change on the individual, community, and national levels. Read below the fold for the scoop on how we do what we do, and our near-term plans!

How We Do It: Our trained Educators travel to high schools and give presentations to groups of high school students, ranging from 25 to 2,500, on climate science and meaningful solutions that they can take on. Check out one of our Educators in action at Rodriguez High in California.

We recently partnered with Alec Loorz, a visionary 14-year old student based in Ventura, CA. Not only is Alec the youngest Al Gore trainee, he founded his own nonprofit: Kids-Vs-Global-Warming. Alec gives presentations around the country, and inspires and engages thousands of young people to take action (and many older people too).

Results: We just started giving our presentations in February, and we’ve already spoken with almost 4,000 high school students. We’ve met students in inner-city Oakland, rural parts of Mendocino, Southern California, and even parts of Nevada. They are not only smart and tech-savvy, but they want to meaningfully get involved in curbing global warming. They are ready to plug into the growing youth climate movement that we’ve been cultivating over the past few years.

We’re based in Oakland, CA, and we’ll be in the Chicago-region, Houston, and New England by the fall.

YEP! Our program doesn’t just stop there, we’re developing a Youth Empowerment Program (YEP!) to support young leaders in the climate movement. Through meaningful partnerships we will look to provide leadership, mentoring and ongoing support for students that take on climate campaigns, start effective environmental clubs, and take action in their communities to Lower their Emissions and Raise their Voice.

If you are a part of an organization that already has a robust program that sounds anything like that, and we haven’t talked to you already (or even if we have), please contact us. We’d love to explore potential partnerships.

Scholarships & Grants: ACE offers $2500 scholarships to high school juniors and seniors, as well as grants of $10,000-20,000 for schools. Check out our website to learn more about them.

Plugging In: ACE is looking to connect with other groups out there led by high school students, groups that work with high school students, and anyone else interested in what we do. We desire to connect and multiply our efforts!

Want to find out more? Check our website: www.climateeducation.org - you can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and Youtube.