Small Grant 2013 – The Sea Party, a Children’s Festival Created by 7th and 8th Grade Students from Greenwood School, for the Earth Day Marin 2013 Festival.
Micro Grant: $1,000
The SFEP Micro Grant supported the April 21, 2013 Earth Day Marin Festival, held at Redwood High School in Larkspur. The focus of the festival was “Climate Change Solutions Day of Action.” The objective of the free festival was for attendees to pledge to take one or more actions in an effort to ameliorate climate change.
Over 5000 people attended the Festival, with several hundred families participating in the activities created and hosted by Greenwood School’s 7th and 8th grade students. Sea Party, the Greenwood student team’s effort, consisted of: an information table; a pledge station; a wish station; six pollution, plastic, and petroleum awareness-raising games; natural (plant-based) face painting; costumed coastal and watershed creatures; an eco-themed mural; and an eco-craft.
The pledge station was the main action that the student team asked children to do at the event. The parents and children wrote out a pledge to undertake one carbon reduction activity, a photograph was taken of the child holding the pledge, and the photographs were projected on a screen during breaks in the adult presentations held in the Redwood Gym.
The Sea Party was an effort to educate the largest growing audience in Marin County (children and their parents) in a fun and developmentally appropriate way about the issues (plastics, pollution, petroleum) that contribute to climate change.
Photos by Julie Hanft