Florida Climate Alliance Initiative

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 Hello! We are a group of three students at Eckerd College and we wanted to tackle some form of environmental policy with our environmental communication project. After deliberation, we settled on trying to kick start an initiative for Florida to join the U.S. Climate Alliance. The U.S. Climate Alliance is a coalition of states that set their own standards for greenhouse gas emissions and use of “clean energy,” in response to the United States dropping out of the Paris Agreement, a global agreement set by the UN increasing action taken that minimizes climate change. Florida is currently not a member of the alliance, but with our informative website and petition, we hope to gain support to bring this issue to the attention of state politicians.


 

We thought a website would be the best way to reach the largest number of people, especially now in the COVID era, action taken virtually can be just as powerful as a protest, or demonstration, and allows viewers to show their support quick and fast without being put in harm's way. Digital media also allows for immediate sharing to anyone anywhere, the information we share and the action we wish to take isn’t confined to one location, even though it is pertaining to Florida, anyone can show their support. In addition, it is a sustainable form of representation, the website will be easy to upkeep and share, unlike knocking door to door or passing out fliers (Pezzullo, 2018). 

In addition, we also didn’t want to be a terribly negative source of media so we kept to the positive aspects of the climate alliance, avoiding any “apocalyptic rhetoric,” or writing that evokes a sense of doom, or the end of the world (Pezzullo, 2018).  We framed our website around the positive impact joining the U.S. Climate Alliance would make, not the disastrous possibilities that would occur if Florida doesn’t change its energy use and behavior. The language we used was balanced between facts and values, engaging a much wider range of viewers from those that have more science-based beliefs, to others who make decisions based on their values. 






We included links to the actual U.S. Climate Alliance website in order for viewers to find even more information on their own and to avoid any question of bias or misinformation. Overall we tried to keep the layout simple and easy to navigate to educate viewers without constraints or confusion, we want the sole focus to be the information the website provides. 




Both words and visual aid were used to balance out the information the website portrayed. In addition, we used media engagement or “clicktivism” to our advantage (Pezzullo, 2018). Our petition allowed viewers to interact and feel a sense of connection and involvement with our initiative at just the click of a button. 

Each of us reached out in different ways on social media and Snapchat, Instagram and Reddit were all great platforms to gain signatures and shares of our website and petition. Our goal was to get at least a hundred signatures and 10 shares, we surpassed both, and support keeps coming in, which is encouraging! If you wish to support our initiative as well, visit our website or you and go straight to the petition by clicking here!
                                              
                           




Overall, this experience ran rather smoothly, none of us were very experienced with web design so it was new territory for us, but I believe we managed well. Working together in a group proved to be somewhat of a challenge since our only form of communication was virtual but we overcame the difficulties, and the outcome was something we are all quite proud of!

Don't forget to sign and share our petition and website!











References and Photos

7 Ways U.S. States are Leading Climate Action. (2019, July 08). Retrieved September 14, 2020, from https://unfoundation.org/blog/post/7-ways-u-s-states-are-leading-climate-action/


Center for Sustainable Systems, University of Michigan. 2019. "Climate Change: Policy and Mitigation Factsheet." CSS05-20.


Luscombe, R. (2020, April 21). Will Florida be lost forever to the climate crisis? Retrieved September 14, 2020, from https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/apr/21/florida-climate-crisis-sea-level-habitat-loss


Marcellini, P. (n.d.). Retrieved September 13, 2020, from 

https://www.paulmarcellini.com/images/xl/_MG_1848.jpg

Office of the Secretary. (n.d.). Retrieved September 14, 2020, from https://floridadep.gov/sec

Pezzullo, P., and Cox, R. (2018). Environmental communication and the public sphere, 5th Edition. Sage Publications.

Seng, K. (2013, October 26). Factory Smoke From Smokestacks Causing Pollution.

Retrieved September 13, 2020, from

https://captainkimo.com/factory-smoke-from-smokestacks-causing-pollution/


U.S. Climate Alliance. (n.d.). Retrieved September 14, 2020, from http://www.usclimatealliance.org/

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