PHOTOS: Christa McAuliffe Charter School Students Explore Climate Change Solutions With Framingham Mayor & City Councilors

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FRAMINGHAM – Grade 8 students at the Christa McAuliffe Charter school focused on climate change impacts and solutions for their culmination project.

Last week, the students held an open house with families, Framingham Mayor Charlie Sisitsky, and a handful of Framingham City Councilors.

As part of their culmination project, each students had to write a letter to the 11-member Framingham City Council, the legislative branch of the City of Framingham government.

“I feel it is worth the extra money to pay for the electricity that is being produced from Green Energy,” said Mayor Sisitsly to a classroom full of eighth graders.

“There is a lot of different programs that the city’s is experimenting with. We have a Sustainability Committee made up of citizens throughout the community that works on some programs. The City Council has a subcommittee on sustainability & environment, and we also have a person dedicated to working on environmental issues. He’s our sustainability coordinator. It might be a nice opportunity to bring him in and try have him talk about climate change and what he’s working on,” said Mayor Sisitsky. “There’s lots of grants in the state and federal government are giving out, so everybody’s tuned into climate change because we all know how important it is and to have the students think about that and make these presentations is terrific. It’s very important for the community.”

Kenny Ndive, in his letter, suggested the city create a city-wide composting program where organize waste could be turned into fertilizer. His primary suggestion was for the city to create a fruit planting program. He told the Mayor 15-30% of the fruit produced could be sold to help sustain the program and the rest of the fruit could be for the public.

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District 8 City Councilor John Stefanini, District 7 City Councilor Leora Mallach, District 5 City Councilor Noval Alexander, District 2 City Councilor Cesar Stewart-Morales and District 1 City Councilor Christine Long attended the event.

“I congratulate all the students here, and the ones in the other classrooms. Hopefully some of the City Councilors will respond to your letters. You got a couple city councils sitting right here, and so you can give them a draft copy of your letter tonight. They can get an early start on it. Thank you for inviting me,” said Mayor Sisitsky.

Student Isabella Lvov wrote in her letter she wanted the City Council should ban or heavily suppress single-serve packaging and encourage residents to purchase in bulk. She spoke with the Mayor about her project & idea.

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