Written by: Antonella Vaquero Ramos
Artwork by: Sheryl Fong
The United States presidential election in 2016 became a turning point in the lives of millions of people, most significantly young Americans, as they experienced a rude awakening of the state of the world. One of these people was a high school student in Seattle named Jamie Margolin (she/her/hers). Before the 2016 election, Margolin recounted that she had always thought about climate change. However, after the election, Margolin realized that she needed to take action herself, and she joined a local environmentalist organization .
When Hurricane Maria hit in the fall of 2017, Margolin and her friends noticed the lack of response from the federal government and saw this series of events as a wake-up call that demonstrated the damages caused by climate change. Margolin and her friends thought that “[t]here need[ed] to be some sort of march, some sort of wake-up call, from the youth to our leaders,” and thus, Zero Hour was founded. After Margolin and her friends founded Zero Hour during the summer of 2017, they knew that they needed to expand their organization and fight against climate change. They decided that the national day of mass action, which is predominantly organized by students ranging in age from elementary school to college – was the ideal place to add more youth voices calling for elected officials to take action on climate change. Soon after, the Zero Hour movement began to grow all across the United States and later internationally.
Now, nineteen-year-old Jamie Margolin is one of the most renowned climate change activists in the world. The accomplishments of Margolin and her Zero Hour team include: suing the state of Washington for “violating their constitutional rights by failing to adequately regulate greenhouse gases,” and testifying in front of the U.S. Congress along with other well-known climate activists. In addition to this, Margolin has written numerous articles for major publications, including the New York Times, Teen Vogue, and CNN, served as a surrogate for Bernie Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign by giving speeches and creating content, and authored a book during the summer of 2020.
Jamie Margolin’s resume is an impressive one; however, what is even more impressive is that she has been able to accomplish all of this before graduating from high school. Often in her interviews, there is a sense that Margolin is an ordinary high school student who just happens to be the founder of a massive climate change activism group. Whether Margolin is stressing over an exam, college admissions, or a crush, she still finds time to be an engaged community organizer. Margolin has stated numerous times that this fight against climate change is not one that she, or anyone else, chose, but it is a fight that needs to be won to save everyone’s future.
I had always known the effects that the climate crisis would have on the world, but it was not until this year that I truly understood the severity and the rapidity in which it might become a reality. I began to see that it has actually started to cause damage in our everyday lives. In my microeconomics class, my professor spent the latter half of the semester highlighting climate change and how much work there needs to be done in the next few years to avoid permanently damaging the Earth. One of the most eye-opening things I learned is that even though we reduced our carbon emissions due to the pandemic, we still have to reduce them even more in order to avoid the effects of the climate crisis. That is why I chose to write about Jamie Margolin. I truly believe that she is an inspiration to all young people, and I greatly admire how hard she has fought for her voice and for the voices of the future to be heard. As a college student myself, I know that students can often get caught up thinking about the future; we focus on getting good grades, getting an internship, and polishing our resumés. However, why are we not taking more action in order to ensure that the future we stress so much about is going to be there for us? While we should look at Margolin as an inspiration, we should also start taking action ourselves and demand our governments protect the future that we are working towards. Just like Margolin states in her The New York Times opinion article, “[i]f adults want youth to be studious and pay attention in school to prepare for our futures, then they need to do their jobs to make sure that a future exists for us.”
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