UC student organization seeks to combat climate change

By Rebecca Schweitzer

A new student environmental club has sprouted at the University of Cincinnati during the year of COVID-19.

Students in UC's College of Arts and Sciences founded Restore Our Mother Earth, or ROME, hoping to create a new kind of environmental advocacy group.   

Megan Porter, a fourth-year pre-law student, and Alec Mack, a third-year neurobiology student, saw the confinement of the past year as an opportunity to build a new community for students. The organization, advised by biology professor Brian Kinkle, approaches environmental issues by focusing on legislation.

“It is one thing to know what causes climate change, but it is another to address the issues with legislators, given they have the power to create laws to protect our environment,” said Porter. “Thus, (our group) became the first environmental advocacy organization focused primarily on environmental policy at the University of Cincinnati.” 

The group focuses on environmental science and the laws and regulations that govern them. The team believes changing laws is the most effective way to address climate change.

Porter and Mack created the club as a way to inform and educate peers on environmental policies. The goal for the organization is to lobby legislators for environmental change to be recognized and addressed, but this cannot be done in-person until Covid-19 restrictions are lifted.

“ROME's goal is to propagate knowledge and spread insight about the situation our planet is in,” said co-founder Alec Mack. “Our planet is dying, and our politicians are letting it happen. We want to open people’s eyes to the injustices being done to our planet.”

While membership is not restricted to College of Arts and Sciences students, all of the group's leaders are in the college. The team feels a strong connection to the college.

“A&S is closely tied to our organization’s purpose,” said Porter. “Our organization focuses on climate change and the environment (sciences) as well as policy and public speaking (arts).”

Porter and Mack hope the university will educate students on their rights as citizens by the addition of environmental policy education courses, as well as more strongly enforce  recycling and trash separation.

Weekly meetings are Wednesdays, for now via Zoom. For information on how to join the organization, follow the group on Instagram or Facebook. The club hopes to provide in-person activities once possible to students such as river clean-ups and fundraisers, as well as implement a climate clock within the UC community.

Featured image at top: Photo/David Mark/Pixabay