Then the real action took place. In less than 15 minutes, the youngsters filled their pots with loam, planted sunflower seeds in the loam, and watered their plants. Residents gave them stick-on letters and patterns to personalize their pots and invited the children to take home their new pots for daily doses of tender loving care.

Typical of the ongoing activity, six-year-old Alexia Hansen (Christine Hansen’s daughter) and Cynthia Rodman (who lives at Linden Ponds) busily prepared and decorated a pot in just a few minutes, which Alexia Hansen proudly showed off to her mother.

“In this program, our residents are really teachers,” says Emma Penti-Sullivan, resident services coordinator at Linden Ponds and also an EAC member. “Our Garden Club members obviously have an interest in planting and preservation and wanted to share their interests with the children.”

According to Penti-Sullivan, concerned groups at Linden Ponds are making a definitive impact on improving the quality of the campus through conservation and preservation efforts such as the Earth Day celebrations.

“We will probably sponsor two environmental programs every year,” Penti-Sullivan says. “These will be daylong educational programs designed to inform others of the need to protect the environment.”

Prior to departing the campus, the youngsters received tips on caring for their budding plants as well as a copy apiece of a Children’s Earth Day Activity Book. Before returning to Weymouth, they individually watered the new Linden tree they helped to plant in the circle.

Because in the future, it will be up to them to think globally and act locally.

Earth Day marks 37 years of protecting the environment

Earth Day was created by the U.S. federal government in 1970—the same year it created the Environmental Protection Agency—to foster awareness of efforts designed to protect the environment and natural resources, while simultaneously reducing pollution and waste-disposal problems.

While Earth Day is officially celebrated in April, millions of Americans are engaged in activities and programs throughout the year that enhance environmental protection.

Since the first Earth Day in 1970, the Clean Air Act was amended and strengthened; the Clean Water Act was enacted; the use of lead-based paint was restricted; the infamous pesticide DDT was banned; the Great Lakes and Chesapeake Bay were cleaned; leaded gasoline was phased out; catalytic converters were introduced into automobiles; fuel-economy and emission standards for automobiles were established; chloroflurocarbons used as propellants in aerosol cans were abolished; the Superfund program was created to repair hazardous waste sites; bans were placed on dumping sewage sludge and industrial waste; recycling efforts throughout the country were introduced and sustained; energy-efficient lighting was encouraged; and many other notable actions were undertaken to enhance living conditions on the planet.