Looking for something digital to do for the 50th anniversary of Earth Day later this month? Katie Eder, 20, has a plan for you and the world.
Eder graduated from Shorewood High School in 2018 and took a gap year (which turned into two years). She starts at Stanford University in the fall. She’s the founding executive director of the Future Coalition and has been putting a lot of work into Earth Day Live, an April 22-24 virtual event for the nation.
Let’s say you attend Earth Day Live digitally, and you see a politician speaking. Well, that person is there in accordance with guidelines agreed to by a variety of climate groups. And those guidelines got agreed to after Eder attended meetings, gathered up what leaders wanted, communicated with various stakeholders, and helped hammer it all out. Such is the daily life of a young activist who lives in Los Angeles but misses Wisconsin coffee shops.
“Most of what I do is talk to people,” Eder said. “Especially now that everyone’s digital, I’m basically on the phone all day.”
Earth Day Live is to be a 72-hour livestream that aims to “engage people across the country and the world in collective action to protect our communities,” according to marketing materials. “We are prepared to do whatever is necessary to protect our futures. We will stop going to school. We will stop going to work. We refuse to participate in a society and economy that is actively destroying our generation’s chance at a livable future.”
Eder’s dream is to see the strike movement gain enough power to make enforceable demands.
Learn more about Earth Day Live at EarthDayLive2020.org or StrikeWithUs.org. For more about Eder, see the next print edition of the Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle, due out May 1.
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