Thirty-five students from five different schools gathered for a series of student-centered, student-curated discussions on environmental leadership for the 2021 Student Symposium on Sustainability on Saturday, April 10.

The discussions, hosted by 19 Moravian Academy Upper School students and included participation from Moravian Academy Upper School, Moravian Academy Middle School, The Swain School, Perkiomen School, and Nazareth Area High School, included the following topics:

• environmentally aware consumerism

• farming and food choice as environmental activism

• fast fashion

• art as environmental activism

• how to be an environmental activist online.

The MA Green Team led interactive conversations that energized and informed their peers in their common goal of improving the health of the planet. MA alumna Emma Lamberti '20 and former faculty member Dr. Gaby Dee also participated in the event.

At the end of the Symposium, the seniors shared these comments:

“When we first joined the Green Team, we could never have imagined being able to do something like this that brings together so many students and perspectives from the Lehigh Valley to actually be able to talk about the environment on both a local and global scale.”

“Sustainability has had a growing importance for all of us, and in the Moravian Academy community, we have still found ways to pursue that goal even though this school year has been different from previous years. This year, we worked toward eliminating single-use plastics from our school-issued lunches on the Merle-Smith Campus and finally achieved it beginning after spring break in early March.”

“With our current global situation, environmental stewardship is more important than ever to our generation. We face the daunting challenges of trying to repair the climate change and global warming that has rapidly distressed our planet. As we’ve grown up, we have watched the changes unfold in certain ecosystems and the dwindling diversity of species in these habitats. This is partly why being able to come together now to discuss these changes and encourage one another to take action, even if it is on a local scale, is so critical.”

Moravian Academy Upper School Green Team members who participated include:

• Audrey Dai '21
• Sophia Cunningham '21
• Deirdre Hoffman '21
• Angela Chen '21
• Maclaine Oskin '21
• Sam Carter '22
• Katy Shnier '22
• Lily Eyvazzadeh '22
• Grace Burcaw '22
• Sophia Brands '22
• Raya Hoges '22
• Devon Jewel '23
• Eli Zemsky '23
• Joey Oltman '24
• Quinn Lauden '24
• Krish Gupta '24
• Megan Dadio '24
• Kanchan Gupta '24
• Rayna Malhotra '24

Upper School students Vince Menichelli '22 and Anya Chadha '24 were also in attendance, as was Josephine Zemsky '26 representing the Middle School.