OJAI : School Nominated for Earth Prize

Oak Meadow High School in Ojai has been nominated to receive the first international Earth Prize for a youth organization.

United Earth, a New York environmental group, will award the $10,000 prize on June 5, the United Nations World Environment Day. An adult organization will receive $50,000.

The United Earth awards will recognize “the most outstanding achievement of environmental leadership and humanitarian excellence,” according to the organization.

It was founded recently by Claes Nobel, a great-grandnephew of Alfred Bernhard Nobel, the benefactor of the Nobel Foundation fund.

A United Earth spokesman said no tally has been done to determine how many youth organizations have been nominated for the prize.

Dulcie de Montagnac, spokeswoman for the United Nations Environmental Programme’s youth division, said she nominated the private Ojai school because she believes it has excelled in environmental awareness programs for three years.

Oak Meadow received a top United Nations environmental award last year. It was honored in a ceremony in Mexico City last June.

Ojai teacher Marilyn Mosley said her class of 20 students plans to be in New York on June 5 for presentation of the Earth Prize.

The gathering of 2,000 children will be held in the General Assembly Hall of the United Nations.

Mosley’s class gained fame in 1989 for a video called “We Can Make A Difference.” The video, which featured interviews with Ojai children, was submitted to the United Nations’ environmental branch.

It has been shown to more than a million people around the world, Mosley said, including groups in Kuwait this year and the French Foreign Legion in Saudi Arabia.

The class made a second video last year, called “Making a Difference Around the World,” and frequently gives workshops titled “The Environmental Race” at schools and environmental fairs.

“We’ve had more than 100 requests to do the workshop, so we’ve decided to put it on video as well,” Mosley said.

In September, class members attended UNICEF’s World Summit on Children and were invited to an international forum in Kenya that only Mosley was able to attend. In October, the school was named one of nine regional finalists for the President’s Environmental Youth Award.

“It’s such an experience to be invited to such places, and it really gives us a chance to get our message across,” Hope Sanders, 17, an Oak Meadow junior, said.

Most students in Mosley’s first environmental-projects class three years ago are now in college, but many return to help each year, the teacher said. One student is now working with Jean-Michel Cousteau in Mexico.