For the young environmentalists of Pampanga, the ongoing pandemic is not a hindrance to continuing their work for Mother Earth.

COVID-19 has forced many young people into staying and studying at home but members of the YES-O (Youth for Environment in Schools Organization) clubs have proven that staying home doesn’t equate to slacking off from advocacy duties.

The youth of San Fernando City schools are up and about planning and working to make sure their organizations and mates are up to speed despite quarantine restrictions.

Rahyan Carl Rodriguez, Information and Communication Technology High School YES-O Club president

Social media power

Kim Dorothy Dayag, Pampanga High School YES-O Club president

Pampanga High School (PHS) YES-O club president Kim Dayag and student council president Eulysis Mananquil said they intend to spread awareness about the environment and the climate crisis that we face through online seminars.

Their main challenge is to find the best way for students to continue learning about the environment despite the physical restrictions.

“We are doing this through combined awareness and practice,” said Mananquil.

PHS has almost 13,000 students but connecting with them is a breeze, said Mananquil. The tech-savvy students are easy to reach via social media. Through bite-sized content, the student leaders make it a goal to inspire their fellow students with tips on recycling and proper waste segregation in their respective homes.

Another project in the works is a video series called “TV Parol.” This aims to show how students can make Christmas decorations with recyclable materials and resources that can be found at home.

Dayag said that this encourages budget-friendly at-home activities that promote environmental awareness by the simple practice of reusing and recycling materials.

More at-home projects

Eulysis Mananquil, Pampanga High School student council president

Students from the Information and Communication Technology High School (ICTHS) have their own thing going.

ICTHS YES-O club president Rahyan Rodriguez described their creative ways to be simple yet impactful. With over 820 students on the campus (100-plus being YES-O club members), simple take-home tasks can go a long way.

Their task: to “gamify” environmental efforts. They’ve done it before and this time, they want their peers to continue doing it at home.

In the last school year, the ICTHS YES-O club mounted a simple project: bins for plastic bottle waste that had cool hand-painted hoops attached to them.

“We wanted to show everyone that the proper disposal of trash is not only helpful for the environment, but also fun and rewarding when accomplished,” Rodriguez said.

To add meaning to the project, Rodriguez and his team sold the collected bottles to fund other YES-O projects, like a timely effort to buy wireless broadband devices to students in need. The ICTHS YES-O club has so far helped 10 students through this.

Rodriguez said he is keeping count of the bottles he shot in his plastic bin hoop. His peers are doing the same and keeping a leaderboard online.

These students have shown that the simple yet clever ways to contribute to environmental efforts can go a long way. Creating buzz online or shooting hoops at home adds depth to their learning experiences in science and the planet that we live in. —CONTRIBUTED

The author is a student writer from Information and Communication Technology High School who trained under The Green Beat Initiative, an online environmental journalism training by the DepEd Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Service and Association of Young Environmental Journalists.