whales<\/a>, sea lions and seals, Schuler said.<\/p>\n“Trash in the marine environment can become an issue for anything,” she said.<\/p>\n
This year’s Coast Cleanup served a dual purpose. Two local schools, Sayéik Gastineau Community School and Thunder Mountain High School, are starting up local chapters of the national Ocean Guardian Schools program.<\/p>\n
The National Marine Sanctuary Fund organizes and helps fund the program, but students lead it, developing conservation, cleanup and advocacy efforts to protect and conserve local watersheds, Schuler said.<\/p>\n
Juneau doesn’t have a National Marine Sanctuary nearby and isn’t eligible for funding from the National Marine Sanctuary Fund. So to kickstart the program, Schuler and organizers for International Coastal Cleanup partnered with Litter Free Inc. to raise funds to get their own programs started. Litter Free Inc., a local nonprofit, pays volunteers to pick up trash locally.<\/p>\n
Both school programs aim to reduce marine debris. Students at Gastineau are hoping to eliminate single-use plastics in their cafeteria and replace their plastic forks with reusable ones. Thunder Mountain’s Ocean Guardian group is still developing an agenda, but Schuler said they’ll be fundraising for marine debris efforts and helping to reduce the use of single-use plastic bottles at the high school.<\/p>\n
Both schools are the first Ocean Guardian Schools in Alaska. Schuler and another NOAA employee are helping get the programs started.<\/p>\n
“We’re hoping that with the success of this program that we can spread within Alaska. These are kind of our prototype schools,” Schuler said.<\/p>\n
Many of the volunteers Saturday were young people like Cruz. A junior at Thunder Mountain High School, Cruz was flanked by two of her classmates, junior Emma Douglas and senior Ashley Murphy. They worked their way around the Seawalk and the waterside of Egan Drive.<\/p>\n
All three said they’re learning a lot in their courses about how trash — especially plastics — can harm the marine environment.<\/p>\n
“We’re actually learning how much litter and plastic there is everywhere and how people don’t care about it,” Cruz said.<\/p>\n
They’re all helping to start the Ocean Guardian Schools program at TMHS. There’s awareness building in their generation, the high schoolers agreed, but people sometimes “need that push.” That could lead to change, Douglas said.<\/p>\n
“We hope to bring it to people’s awareness, that we need to be the generation to change it,” Douglas said.<\/p>\n
\n\u2022 Contact reporter Kevin Gullufsen at 523-2228<\/b><\/p>\n
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