Interactive Simulation Blog Post

Environment   Sep 27, 2016 by Katrina Finnigan

Hello! Welcome to Harem and Katrina’s first blog post. We are excited to share our views on today’s pressing issues with other students. Today we tried out different simulations dealing with our water footprint. A water footprint is the impact we have on the freshwater of our community.

While we were doing the simulation, we were intrigued that when we changed a single factor in the simulation, it affected the rest of the environment. After much thought, we saw how these simulations related to our community. These simulations relate to our community because they show us what our community looked like in the past. Based on that information, the simulations show us what our community will look like in the future. We think that it’s important for everyone to acknowledge the negative impact we are all having on the environment and make an effort to looking into how we can change the way we live and the impact we have on the environment. Refusing to work towards a better future will have disastrous results. Climate change will eventually destroy the world that we love. For that reason, we do not feel that any of the information in the simulation was irrelevant to our current situation.

We also found out that these simulations helped us to find our place in combatting climate change. We realized that trying to make changes that effect the environment in a positive way will take a very long time to do. This is no easy task. Since we students have no influence politically or scientifically, we must try our best to inform others about what is happening with our planet. We can inform others by creating projects, presentations, speeches, etc. By making a plan of action towards change, we can work toward a brighter future. Doing this ensures that others will be informed and therefore empowered to make decisions that will benefit the world we live in.

After talking about how this simulation changed the way we think climate change should be tackled, we both realized that we have different ideas.

Harem thinks that these simulations have changed the way she thinks climate change should be tackled. She has only now realized that climate change would not only negatively impact the world, but also her community specifically. She thinks that if she were to just know that climate change negatively impacts other places in the world, she might not care as much. It is when she thinks about damage to her own community, that the problem becomes more real. Now she thinks that it should be tackled more directly and that more should be done to make sure that as little damage as possible is done.

Katrina, on the other hand, thinks that these simulations have not changed how she thinks climate change should be tackled because of the previous knowledge she already had. This is because she has made a conscious decision to be aware of what is going on with our planet's ecosystems. She has always been concerned about how governments, corporations and major populations deal with environmental situations. It is often the case that money is more important than the future of our planet. She believes that climate change should be tackled by creating more programs for endangered species, water purification, etc. If we all band together to work toward using our money and resources toward the general good, she believes that we will have the ability to impact our future in a very positive way.

Overall, we feel that due to climate change, our freshwater resources are in grave danger, and there is only one way that we can solve these problems: reaching out to other youth. Getting our generation active in working towards possible solutions is what needs to be done. Let’s start this journey together and see what great ideas we can come up with!

- Harem and Katrina

Post comment