POCATELLO — A recently revitalized club at Pocatello High School will join Zoo Idaho staff for the fourth annual Earth Day Clean-up event at the zoo and Ross Park on Saturday.
The 12 members of Pocatello High School’s Earth Club from 9 to 11 a.m. Saturday will do their part to take care of the planet by collaborating with Zoo Idaho staff to pick up trash in and around the zoo and lower and upper Ross Park, says the club’s adviser and a teacher at Pocatello High School, Eric Pankau.
“Zoo Idaho coordinated this event and it will involve volunteers doing some clean-up work and some restoration and improvement efforts around the park and the zoo,” Pankau said. “The plan is to get the zoo ready for when it opens to the general public for the summer months.
“Basically, we are doing some dewinterizing and want to make the Ross Park area as nice as we can.”
Pankau said the Pocatello High School Earth Club has been around for many years but was recently revived by some progressive underclassmen who wanted to better the environment and local community.
The club meets regularly on Wednesdays and the clean-up event at the zoo and Ross Park will be their first event since COVID-19 pandemic gathering restrictions have been loosened.
Pankau said any member of the community is encouraged to join the earth club on Saturday and the first few dozen volunteers will get a free Pocatello High School Earth Club T-shirt. The shirts are green with a blue earth printed on the front with a feathered headband wrapped around the planet.
Also, the earth club members plan to set up a booth near the front entrance to Zoo Idaho to hand out handmade vinyl stickers as a club fundraiser. The club is asking people to donate $5 or more for each sticker.
Rachael Shearouse, the education curator at Zoo Idaho, has spearheaded the Earth Day Clean-up event. She says the local McDonald’s restaurant is sponsoring the event and will be providing free food and beverages to all of the volunteers. Zoo Idaho will also be providing all of the gloves and trash bags volunteers will use to pick up litter.
Something unique about the clean-up event this year, Shearouse said, is that every volunteer will be asked to keep track of what type of trash they are picking up.
“It’s not just a regular clean-up where you’ll throw all the trash in the bag and be done with it,” Shearouse said. “We actually use the Trash Free Seas collection form from the Ocean Conservancy, which keeps track of marine debris. They also partner with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration so our volunteers will record what type of trash they are picking up so we can send that data in and they can keep track of what types of plastic and waste we are seeing throughout the U.S.”
Shearouse continued, “This event will put Zoo Idaho on the Ocean Conservancy and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration clean-up maps as well as the national Earth Day Clean-up map.”
Shearouse said she was excited the Pocatello High School Earth Club will be joining Zoo Idaho staff for this event, adding that the group’s focus on improving the environment is a natural partnership for the zoo.
In addition to the Earth Day Clean-up event, the Pocatello High School Earth Club has taken a broad approach to taking care of the local environment. The club is in the process of scheduling several clean-up events, adopting a local trail and partnering with the Sagebrush Steppe Land Trust and Portneuf River Vision Study to schedule additional clean-up and outreach events.
“The students have also expressed an interest in trying to promote healthy outdoor living and outdoor recreation that might help the community be healthy from a mental and physical perspective,” Pankau said. “They are working to organize some fly fishing and fly tying events for young kids to try and get them excited about working and playing in the outdoors. Really, anything that incorporates a healthy way to utilize the outdoors and educate people about the environment is fair game for this club.”
Those interested in volunteering for the Zoo Idaho Earth Day Clean-up event are encouraged to contact Pankau via email at pankauer@sd25.us or Zoo Idaho staff by calling 208-234-6264.
“We were really lucky that the zoo had already organized this event and we were able to join in,” said Pocatello High School Earth Club President Dane Durham. “To us as a club, this is important because we only have one planet Earth so we need to keep it clean and protected.”
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