The second grade classes at East Palestine Elementary School raising awareness for issues facing polar bears.

© Krista Birk Figley

1/13/2016 6:19:58 PM

Wednesday Shout Out {Schools and Zoos for Polar Bears}

The second grade classes at East Palestine Elementary School worked hard to raise awareness about polar bears. To start, they held a fundraiser to symbolically adopt a polar bear.

Their teacher, Krista Birk Figley wrote, "We are also challenging our community to take the '2 Up 2 Down' Thermostat Challenge. We are working hard to help. Very proud of these students."

So far, they have raised a total of $790 for PBI and still have a week of fundraising to go. "We are so excited to share this news with you! We will be using $200 for adoptions and the rest will be donated to you soon," Birk Figley said.

In addition to the donation, we are thrilled that the second grade classes are learning about polar bear conservation and sharing this with their community.

We received the final grant report from Lauren Augustine of the Foundation for the Conservation of Salamanders. She was awarded one of the PBI Conservation Grants for the American Association of Zoo Keepers (AAZK) membership last spring. The PBI Conservation Grant provides leaders in the AAZK community with supplemental funds to carry out conservation action programs that target carbon reduction behaviors in one's institution and/or community.

The grant was for the Chopsticks for Salamanders initiative, reusable chopsticks as a forest stewardship project to help preserve important carbon sinks and salamander habitat.

Augustine wrote, "The money awarded by the Polar Bears International Conservation Grant was used to purchase supplies to aid in the effective communication of the CFS mission to the general public...Because of the generous support of PBI, CFS had the extra funds to purchase chopsticks and educational materials in bulk for the first time, saving our organization $700 per thousand pairs of chopsticks and generating that much more money for conservation."

One of PBI's Canadian Arctic Ambassador Centers celebrated International Polar Bear Day (normally February 27^th) on social media recently. Zoo sauvage de Saint-Felicien, in Quebec, posted on their Facebook page:

"It's the polar bears anniversary this weekend. Saturday and Sunday, visitors will distribute frozen surprises to the bears... The naturalists will give information on the conservation status of the species in the wild and explain how you can help."

They continued with a list of ways to reduce CO₂ emissions:

- use public transport
- carpool
- optimize your use of the car
- keep your car well maintained, it will reduce the fuel consumption
- reduce the use of plastics (made from petroleum)
- reduce your electricity consumption:
- lower the heater by 1 or 2 degrees or increase the air conditioning by 1 or 2 degrees in summer
- unplug unused electric devices or appliances (phantom power)
- use your household appliances at full capacity.

It's time to act. For the bears, for us! Share.