• This month, Kane County Connects will highlight the organizations that are working to conserve and protect our local environment. Check out this “Countdown to Earth Day” feature every day from now until April 22 to learn more about the people and projects that are helping to improve sustainability throughout the Fox Valley. Today’s article was contributed by Emily Carbray, president of the Geneva High School Environmental Club and intern for the Kane County Division of Environmental & Water Resources.

For many students at Geneva Community High School, dedication to the environment doesn’t extend past recycling. However, for a small group of students at GHS, the environment is their main priority. The Environmental Club at Geneva High School focuses on volunteering in the community and promoting sustainability at school.

Previously, the Environmental Club has helped with seed collections at Fermilab and coordinated the fundraising event, “Wine, Cheese, and Trees.” They also spend time planting their own veggies in the school greenhouse. However, their biggest event by far at the high school is Earth Week.

To start off the week, the club decorated the outside of the school with sidewalk chalk, so that when students and faculty arrived at the school on Monday they’d be more aware of Earth Week. Along with the sidewalk chalk, the club created buttons to sell that had sayings like “Save the Bees,” “Love your Earth,” and “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.”

The club is also selling “earth grams.” These are little notes student can send to their friends that will be delivered on Earth Day with flowers.

All of the money raised from the buttons and earth grams will be donated to the local environmental nonprofit The Conservation Foundation. Yet, the money is not the club’s main priority. For the Environmental Club, the week is about promoting awareness of environmental issues and celebrating Earth Day at the high school — all to get more students and faculty to think green!