Fridays for Future

Four years ago Greta Thunberg sat outside the Swedish parliament building holding a sign that read “Skolstrejk för klimatet”. School strike for the climate crisis. First she sat alone, but over time she has been joined by over 14 million strikers across 216 different countries.

Fridays for Future is a global movement of students striking for climate action during school hours on Fridays. Lyra Sales and Teegan Walshe are Grade 9 students at KSS who have initiated a weekly Fridays for Future strike at the town hall of Qualicum Beach.

“Fridays for Future started about four years ago,” Sales says, “and we just started around 7 weeks ago.” While they may be new to this movement, Sales and Walshe have been passionate about environmental issues from a young age. They plan to continue their strike for as long as it takes until the “Government acknowledges that we are in a crisis”. Walshe says, “we want people to accept that we’re not doing enough, and make a plan and start actually doing it. We’ve heard the government say a lot of things and make a lot of goals but we haven’t actually lived up to them enough.”

At the UN Climate Change Conference in 2015, countries signed an international treaty on climate change. The main goal was to limit global warming to under 1.5 degrees celsius. Depending on the results of COP26 we will see whether or not we are on track to meet those goals. The United Nations chief said, “limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius will be impossible without immediate, large-scale emissions cuts”. The global temperature continues to rise. “We need action and we need climate awareness implemented in our lives and government (and) laws” Sales says. Walshe says “we are protesting inaction and people ignoring that the climate crisis is so urgent right now.” “We need to see the numbers go down!”.

When asked how teachers reacted, Sales said “all our teachers were very supportive.” “They recognize we’re planning for our futures, but how can we do that if we have no certainty that there will be one.”

These two students have been protesting in torrential rain and fierce wind. They plan to continue their protest no matter the weather, no matter how cold.

Teegan and Lyra encourage others to take a stand and protect the planet.