“Soon, we will miss a brief and rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a liveable and sustainable future for all.” This bleak sentence appeared in the second part of a three-part report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on the current state of climate change around the globe.The report painted a grim picture for what the future could hold for the inhabitants of earth if measures are not taken soon to address these pressing climate change issues.

This past Monday, the IPCC released the third part of their sixth Assessment Report; a report released every five to seven years by the United Nations examining global climate change and the effects it has on the livelihoods of people. The report was released in three parts: the first concerning the physical science behind climate change, the second dealing with impacts and the vulnerability of populations to climate change, and the third acknowledging how climate change can be mitigated and treated. 

Rising sea levels, an intensified water cycle, and thawing permafrost are three areas of concern that were highlighted in part I of the IPCC report, released August 9, 2021. The report stated that human beings are the main cause behind the 1.1 degrees Celsius warming change that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution. The report states that, over the next 20 years, unless drastic changes are implemented, the earth’s warming will exceed 1.5 C. Previously, scientists had stated that once global warming surpasses 1.5 degrees C, extraordinary natural disasters will become much more prevalent, heat waves will become much more frequent and winter seasons will be shortened, all of which would have a negative effect on the earth’s natural ecosystems.

In February, the IPCC released the second installment of its report, which focuses on specific impacts that global warming could have on the environment and on human beings. The report painted a grim outlook on the near future of the planet. By 2100, a date in which some students but certainly students' children will be alive, the earth will look starkly different from the environment that we currently  live in. Four times the number of extreme weather events (i.e. harsh tornadoes, hurricanes and flooding) will occur in 2100 and beyond if the average temperature is raised by a few tenths of a degree; bringing the potential for great harm and damage to human life and livelihood.

With the release of the report, media attention has highlighted the report's findings and sparked renewed interest and concern from governments and corporations. Within the St. Louis U. High community, administrators, faculty members and students have recognized the need to address climate change and sustainability issues within the school community. 

“When I think about sustainability, I think about my daughter and the fact that I  want to make sure that she can feed her children, that there's fresh water and that there's a source of energy that she could access and that she's not threatened physically because everyone is fighting for the resources,” said social studies teacher Anne Marie Lodholz.

So far, 3.3 billion people have been affected by climate change in some capacity, the report states, the majority of whom live below the poverty line. This trend of global warming having the greatest impact on the already marginalized is going to continue to worsen as more and more people will die from natural disasters and heat waves caused by global warming. 

“Half the world's population is in a dire state of being severely impacted by climate change, and that's bad. That's a lot of folks that will suffer,” said AP Environmental Science teacher Bill Anderson. “The marginalized are the ones that are really going to take—and have taken—a hit early on.”

Financially, corporations and governments will continue to spend more and more money as they build back and clean up from these natural disasters and restore the communities that were affected. A majority of this money will come from taxpayer dollars and insurance. 

“Let's say you have a flooded community where water damage is, and FEMA has to come in to help. The funding that FEMA uses is costing taxpayer money. It's not a free handout from the government,” said AP Economics teacher Rob Hill, a retired financial investor who worked as a clean energy finance professional. “If we don't address it, and we get to a tipping point in regards to climate change, it's only going to get costlier when we use fossil fuels versus really investing in renewable energy.”

Hope is not lost, however, as the third report, which was released on Monday, discusses what measures can be taken in order to address climate change and how to slow down global warming. The report cites that the best means to curbing global warming is to transition to clean, renewable energy sources as soon as possible. Coal consumption must be slashed by 95 percent and natural gas usage must be cut by 60 percent. While this seems daunting, over the past decade, renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar energy, have become increasingly more affordable over the past decade, and measures are being taken by governments to create infrastructure by implementing more wind farms, purchasing solar panels, and limiting deforestation. 

Government politics and overall reluctance to change are proving to be the greatest foes in the struggle to limit carbon emissions and curb global warming. The report warns that unless governments and corporations stop climate change disinformation from spreading and begin investing more money into researching and purchasing renewable energy resources, then change is unlikely to happen. 

To an individual, the report may appear to be a gloomy, daunting portrait of a situation that they have no control over. Yet, each individual has the opportunity to respond to the report and begin to implement small changes in their lives and actively try to learn about the environment and global warming.

“This is  a problem on a global scale. Often we think the choices we make as an individual in our daily lives are probably not going to have a big impact,” said Anderson. “The biggest thing one can do to address this issue, I think, is to make sure that all of us get educated and stay educated on the issues and on the science.”

While the responsibility of proper education falls on the individual, St. Louis U. High is beginning to recognize and reevaluate how the school addresses climate change and global warming within the student body. As a Jesuit institution, the school seeks to abide by the four Universal Apostolic Preferences set by the Society of Jesus, one of which is Care for our Common Home. 

Currently, the school has a Sustainability Committee which meets periodically throughout the year to discuss SLUH’s sustainability efforts and how the school can improve to become a better steward of the earth and its natural resources. 

“We've created commissions at the school for people who are responsible for leading efforts in those areas, and there's been a fair amount of work that's been done,” said Jim Linhares, Assistant Principal for Mission. “While we have done some great work, we also  have to ask: where are we heading and what is next?”

Within recent years, the committee has made progress in securing new sustainability measures to be undertaken by the entire school. The most recent shift: reimagining SLUH’s wastestream, specifically in regards to the cafeteria. 

“Recently, Food Service Consultants (the company that provides SLUH’s catering) has also shifted their waste stream in a giant way. That was because President Alan Carruthers told FSC that he wanted the waste stream to be reduced because there's absolutely no reason that we should be throwing so much away,” said Lodholz.

Over the past two years, the cafeteria has undergone major shifts in its handling of food waste and the containers it serves meals in. As a result of the pandemic, FSC was forced to serve meals in separate containers. In an effort to reduce waste, FSC chose containers that were either recyclable or compostable, allowing students to dispose of their food containers in a sustainable fashion. This effort to use sustainable containers has continued into this year, allowing the school to send less trash to a waste facility. 

“FSC has worked very diligently because the waste stream has shifted, just from a supplier standpoint,” said Lodholz. 

The cafeteria is not the only space being examined into how the school can limit food waste and promote sustainable food production. In 2013, the school opened the Backer community garden. Over the past years, the garden has developed into a thriving space that is being used to grow a variety of vegetables and plants by SLUH faculty. Classes such as Anderson’s AP Environmental Science class will make periodic treks to the garden to plant and harvest the vegetables, while learning about the importance of sustainable farming practices and the growing need for urban agriculture. 

Outside of the realm of food and food waste, SLUH has taken initial steps to adjust to renewable energy sources, conserve energy, and limit its dependency on fossil fuel sources for powering the school.    

In 2013, the school installed solar panels on the roof. While these solar panels do not produce enough energy to power the entire school, it is a start on the path to making the SLUH campus completely dependent on renewable energy sources. Administrators and faculty members alike hope that SLUH will continue adding more solar panels in its effort to create a sustainable campus. 

“We have some solar panels but I would really like to see us really increase our solar energy generation on campus,” said Linhares. “We have a lot of roof space and the roof just got fixed, so I would love to see us take a big step (in increasing solar energy generation).”

While adjusting the campus to be more dependent on renewable energy is perceived as a righteous move to help protect the longevity of the earth and be good stewards of the globe, it will have its monetary costs. Even as renewable energy sources are becoming more widely available and cheaper, a hefty price tag remains. 

“There are a lot of opportunities here to upgrade our facilities to be more sustainable, which I think is the right move. We can move to double pane windows, we’ve talked about solar panels, we've talked about HVAC systems, controls that will turn off the lights automatically when people aren't in them,” said Hill. “It will cost some money and  I don't know what our funds are for that. But I personally think when you're going to do it, it's a good idea to do it kind of holistically, kind of have a game plan for doing all of that stuff at once.” 

The climate report stated that carbon  emissions must be reduced if nations want to keep the global temperature from surpassing 1.5 degrees C. One of the most effective ways to remove carbon  from the atmosphere is to plant more trees and increase greenspace. SLUH’s campus lacks trees and natural landscapes with the majority of SLUH’s outdoor campus containing large open fields. One solution that has been proposed to help SLUH achieve its sustainability goals is to utilize the vast swaths of SLUH’s available green spaces by planting more trees and gardens. The hope is to transform more parts of the outdoor campus to resemble the courtyard by the upperfield. 

“One hope I have is that the campus just reflects the natural outdoor beauty that it should have,” said Linhares. “We don't have much of nature itself on our property. I would love for us to do a strategic plan for the planting and sustainable footprint of our outdoor spaces.”

While reexamining the school’s energy policy and utilizing its free green space could lead to costly expenditures, a cheaper route that the school can take to addressing climate change is implementing educational material more deliberately into the school’s curriculum. One solution is to make sustainability a prominent part of a freshman year course in order to better educate students at a young age. 

“Some teachers do a really good job placing climate change issues into their curriculum,” said senior Lucas Navarro.”But placing more education about sustainability and climate change  into the science and social studies classrooms would be great. I think those are great places where  some of those lessons can fit in really well, just as part of the natural learning process.”

“The only people that really get the message and importance of sustainability are seniors in AP Environmental Science, and that's 24 kids on their way out the door, which is great for those 24. But it's a message that should be part of the freshmen curriculum,” said Anderson. “We need to be teaching sustainability  from the get go. Sustainability  is an important message. It's obvious it's a message of importance, because we're hearing that message over and over from the Pope.”

Despite sustainability having little presence in the overall curriculum, groups of students are taking great passion in raising awareness for these issues and bringing environmental matters to the forefront of student life. 

“The young people give me great hope,” said Anderson. “I think the passion is there. The concern is there. The willingness and openness to learn is there. And that's what it's going to take and I think that's going to make all the difference in fighting climate change.” 

One such student is Navarro, who since freshman year has taken great interest in sustainability efforts around the school and is actively involved in the energy team. 

“For me, it's been a lifelong passion. My mother used to work in a corporate environment, nonprofit, and being around her really kept me informed about issues of suitability, and about what is  happening to our planet,” said Navarro. “That kind of led me in freshman year to contact  Mrs. Lodholz, sustainability chair. I joined the energy tema and that has let me become even more involved with  sustainability efforts.”

As nations and companies around the globe begin to come to terms with the stark portrait painted by the IPCC report, the question of who will be a leader in this sustainability movement has arisen. At SLUH, administrators and faculty alike aspire to making the school a model of sustainable practices and environmental education. But they recognize that the school has not achieved this status yet. Without deliberate, intentional actions and decisions, the school will not be able to take its place as a leader in ecological justice. 

“We should be doing things in the sustainability field that make it easier for other schools to do the same. We should be leading the way,” said Linhares. “But we are not there yet. I would like us to be there. I would like us to aspire for this goal. This might be setting lofty goals or thinking about implementing very specific things, like what kinds of machines might we have in the cafeteria to grind food, or should we add solar panels? It might mean things like, having a designated person in a leadership role, who has a decent stipend to lead these efforts. That's where we need to go. We need to decide where to lead here in order to create a more sustainable world.”