 Tomorrow evening - Saturday at 8:30 p.m. - we
are invited to join millions of people around the world in making a
statement about climate change by turning off our lights for Earth
Hour. An event created by the World Wildlife Fund, Earth Hour
was created in Sydney, Australia in 2007. In two years
it has grown from an event in one city to a global movement.
Last year, millions of people, businesses,
governments and civic organizations around the globe turned off the
lights for Earth Hour. 26 major cities and 300 smaller cities and
towns signed up to participate. Canadians in about 150 communities,
including London, Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver, pledged to turn
off their lights for 60 minutes.
In Ottawa, the Peace Tower and its
four-faced clock above Canada's Parliament went black. This year,
the lights will go out at the Acropolis in Athens, the Empire State
Building in New York City, and the Petronas Towers in
Malaysia.
For Earth Hour 2009, organizers had hoped
to sign up 1,000 cities. But almost 2,400 cities, towns and
municipalities in 83 countries have agreed to take part in the
event. Just under 19,000 businesses and 5,500 organizations have
signed on.
There is a great deal of support for this
initiative at the school level and many of our schools are marking the event in some way
as well as providing education for students
about it's importance. St. Michael Catholic Elementary School in
London is a good example of what is going on at the school
level: all day today hallway lights are off and some classroom
lights as well. Computers are turned off when not in use. For one
hour, beginning at 1:15 this afternoon, everything in the school is
off.. The school is also promoting litterless lunches today and a
school yard cleanup. The picture above is from last year's Earth
Hour, where Grade 5 & 6 students at Sacred Heart
Catholic School in Parkhill worked diligently with the lights off.
Wilma de Rond, Director of Education, asked
staff at the Catholic Education Centre to make sure all
non-essential energy-using devices are turned off before they
go home tonight. She has also asked them to consider sitting in the
dark with their families for earth hour - tomorrow night from 8:30 -
9:30 - or at least turning off non-essentials in the house
for that hour. "As a system of Catholic Education, we are
called to be stewards of God's creation," said Director de
Rond. "May we remember the many blessings we receive from God's
wondrous creation of the Earth and humbly pray:
Blessed is
the tree which takes time to sink deep roots - it shows us what we
have to do in order to withstand the storm.|
Blessed
is the seed which falls on good soil and so produces a rich harvest
- it shows us what happens when we take the World
of God
to heart.
Blessed is
the rain which falls without favour on the fields - in it we see a
reflection of God's indiscriminate love for all His children.
Blessed are
we, who care for God's creation - it shows we are the eyes, hands
and ears of God on Earth. Amen."
Kathleen Wynne, Minister of Education, said
that last year 29 boards and more than 925 schools across the
province registered for Earth Hour. " This outpouring
of support shows how much educators and students care about climate
change," she said. "You are leaders, teaching not just
your students but entire communities about the importance of the
environment and that we can do something about it."
For more information on
Earth Hour, please visit this
site.
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For feedback,
submissions, suggestions and input, please contact:
:j.boles@office.ldcsb.on.ca
or contact:
John Boles,
Manager of Communications,
519-663-2088, ext
40015
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Spotlight
is produced weekly by
the
Communications Department of the
LDCSB.
Spotlight is a BRAVO Award
winner for demonstrated excellence, recognized by the Canadian
Association of Communicators in Education and a winner of the
Glorya Nanne Award from the Ontario Association of Parents
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fostering better understanding of Catholic Education.
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