All the students and Mr. Gerchak posing on the staircase they climbed for the challenge.
A seventh grade science class at Brown County Middle School chose to work together to face a unique and demanding challenge this trimester, in hopes of bringing awareness to global warming.
That goal was to climb the height of the world’s tallest glacier on a staircase just outside the middle school building.
The connection between climbing stairs and global warming was formed when the students, led by teacher David Gerchak, began learning about pollution caused by human industry and how it speeds up the rise in global temperatures.
Through their research on the topic, students identified the tallest glacier in the world to be Glacier Khumbu, which is located right next to Mount Everest.
Because of the proximity, a base camp was positioned on the glacier for climbers to prepare for an ascent of the mountain for many years.
Due to climate change, the students learned that Glacier Khumbu is rapidly melting — at a rate of around 1 meter per year.
The shrinkage led to a decision made in June of this year to move the Everest base camp to a safer location.
To bring awareness to the rising temperatures — specifically what is causing them and how they are affecting the Earth — the class decided to challenge themselves to climb enough stair steps to reach the top of Glacier Khumbu.
Through a combined effort, the students greatly exceeded their goal. Their total height surpassed the summit of Mount Everest, which is the highest point above sea level on the whole planet.
To record how high the class climbed, Gerchak measured the staircase outside the building to be nine feet in elevation.
Each time a student climbed the stairs, nine feet were added to the total distance climbed to reach their initial goal of 24,900 feet.
The students ultimately reached a final height of 31,734 feet, which is taller than the summit of Mount Everest by almost 2,700 feet.
Gerchak emphasized that no one was forced to climb the stairs. All the students faced the challenge voluntarily.
When asked why they took on the task, student Justice Lamaster-Smith answered “out of our hearts.”
“If a bunch of 7th graders can do this, I feel like a bunch of adults can come together and at least try and help,” student Emma Ahner, said.
Written on the classroom’s whiteboard is a list of the climbing totals from each class period.
Right beside the goals is a quote from one of the students, Bradon Riggen, inspiring the students to keep climbing: “Just like climbing a mountain, climate change is difficult but we believe you can do it.”
Gerchak said the class has been spending time learning about recent climate summits that have been taking place, where world leaders meet to discuss and plan solutions to climate change.
One of the solutions is reducing polluting emissions from large, industry-based countries.
“Countries like the U.S. that produce the most of the greenhouse gasses are now being asked to actually pay reparations to the smaller countries that are being devastated by rising water levels, that sort of thing,” Gerchak said.
This project motivated the students to take action outside of class as well.
Neka Nabors said that this project led her to clean up trash near her home and Allison Blee said she did the same around the school grounds.
The students unanimously agreed that climbing such a great distance on the stairs was tough, but doing it as a group, for a good cause, made it a lot of fun too.
