ShoreRivers’ 2024 Upper Shore Youth Environmental Action Summit was the organization’s largest yet, with 150 students and 14 teachers in attendance from eight different schools.
Last month, high school students from Kent, Caroline, Queen Anne’s, Talbot, and Dorchester counties gathered at Chesapeake College for ShoreRivers’ third annual Upper Shore Youth Environmental Action Summit. This was the organization’s largest Summit yet, with 150 students and 14 teachers in attendance from eight different schools.
This annual Summit aims to empower future leaders of the environmental movement to take action today. One attendee remarked that “[the Summit] showed me how possible it is, even for people my age, to take action in my community. I felt inspired when I left.” ShoreRivers’ work to protect Eastern Shore waterways through science-based advocacy, restoration, and education is only strengthened when youth voices are uplifted and students know that they don’t have to wait to get involved on behalf of their local waterways.
Student leaders, who worked alongside ShoreRivers’ staff to plan the 2024 Upper Shore Youth Environmental Action Summit, are pictured ahead of the day’s keynote address with speaker Angela Crenshaw, Director of the Maryland Park Service. From left are Linda Gayle, Sophia Principe, Finn Merrick, Will O’Donnell, Ella Foote, Angela Crenshaw, ShoreRivers’ Morgan Buchanan, Faith Walstrum, Jessica Hammond, and Carissa Shue.
The day’s events included a networking breakfast, a keynote address, workshop sessions, and a closing celebration. Since its start, ShoreRivers’ Summit has been by students for students. As in past years, a group of student leaders worked with ShoreRivers staff to plan the event. A new partnership with Maryland Association for Environmental and Outdoor Education (MAEOE) brought an additional focus on green careers to the day.
Students pose with a tree they planted at Chesapeake College during a workshop at ShoreRivers’ 2024 Upper Shore Youth Environmental Action Summit.
The networking breakfast featured special guest Paul Monteiro, Secretary of the Department of Civic and Service Innovation, who offered students the opportunity to learn about Maryland’s new Service Year Option. Also in attendance were 15 organizations offering job, internship, volunteer, and education opportunities. Students then heard from keynote speaker Angela Crenshaw, Director of the Maryland Park Service, who spoke about her environmental action journey, her career path, and how she approaches her work with gratitude. The afternoon workshop sessions included 10 distinct options that discussed a wide array of topics from trees to lobbying to water quality.
ShoreRivers is grateful for this year’s Summit sponsors: Dockray Charitable Foundation, The Curtis and Edith Munson Foundation, The Campbell Foundation, IKEA, Chesapeake College, the Maryland Agricultural Education and Rural Development Assistance Fund, Phillips Wharf Environmental Center, Chesapeake Bay Trust, the Abel Family, Refill Goodness, the Maryland Park Service, Chesapeake Watershed Semester at the Gunston School, the Youth Climate Institute, and Chesapeake Bay Foundation.