Taking action with students opinions; Shouting out class letters on CNN10

     On Feb. 14, Mrs. Kolbi Stahl’s class took time to watch the CNN10 of the day and had their own opinions on it that they wanted to speak about. Stahl says, “we were watching the story about a private space port being built in the middle of a nature reserve in Georgia, and it was a big back and forth between the state government and the county government and the people.”

     She continues, “essentially, the space port would be in the middle of a nature reserve with no adequate fire support, so if something were to blow up, it would just ravage the wildlife area. The kids got really upset about this because they showed what fire support they did have, which was like a little nerf gun as a water spout or a little flapper to help stamp out the flames.”

     The students were frustrated about that, so they wanted to do something about it. In their previous reading unit they learned all about their rights and how they have a right to freedom of speech, as well as how they can talk to their representatives about changing things and making their voices heard.

     So, the class decided that they’re going to use those rights to their advantage. They researched both sides of the opinion, then got their own opinion and decided to write letters to the governor of Georgia, to Camden County Council, their representatives, President Biden, and to CNN10.

     Stahl says, “all of them were sent out to those representatives and then we got on to CNN10 and we actually got some letters back from different representatives and some from the governor of Georgia as well.”

     Student Eugene Lieble says he wrote to the governor of Georgia and to CNN10. In his letter, he spoke about how he was concerned about the wildlife and the people living in the area. He was also concerned about being able to put out the fires because they didn’t have a lot of equipment. Lieble even got a response back.

     On the show,  host Coy Wire says “[Thanks] to Mrs. Stahl’s class at North Harford High School in Maryland, determined to make this world a bit of a better place.” When they started researching and writing, it took the class about two weeks. They were featured on the show on March 13.