Environmental science and biology teacher, Mr. Eric Hickman, has presented an earth day extravaganza for the past two years at McNicholas in collaboration with his students. The earth day celebration took place on Monday April 22, 2024 open to students from Guardian Angels, McNicholas students, and parents to enjoy the hard work towards appreciation of the earth and sustainability.
“One of the major things God has taught us is that the earth is precious,” Hickman states as inspiration for the Going Green celebration. The galleries around the school featured student exhibits in appreciation of creation.
In their environmental science class, Hickman guides students through learning about the different aspects of the ecosystem and food chain to understand the importance. “The creation of our earth is very important, and we want to protect it and that’s what we want to do as Catholics (and) Christians, we want to make sure we are protecting our planet. And this is one we can show it” Hickman states.
This year, changes were made to ensure the students were aware of the importance of protecting our earth. There were more interactive activities put into place to give students a hands-on learning experience made entirely from recycled or reused materials. Instead of just being told about recycling and how to save the earth, they got to go to many areas of the high school to see variations of how recycling has a positive effect on the earth.
In the theatre, students were given smoothies made with greens. In the new garden, robots being used for weeding were on display. In the gym, the student’s science fair projects were displayed and sports game created from reused materials. The gym had many posters and games students could participate in. The glass hallway was decorated with all pretty greens and showed the beauty of our earth.
“They will think of recycling as more fun because we made games out of it and showed them crafts” Sophomore Lexi Richmond states.
Since it was activity based, the students at McNick creating the exhibits not only got a better understanding of how to reduce, reuse, and recycle, they also can easily carry out this out outside of school.
“Last year was more the big [decorations], we went big, this year we scaled it back and focused more on the interactive side” Hickman states. The shift in focus resulted in a well-attended celebration for 2024’s earth day with positive feedback from attendees.
The McNicholas Milestone 