Blog and photo by Suzy Schlosberg, Chicago Youth Alliance for Climate Action

Friday, September 20, was the Global Youth Climate Strike. This was the first Friday school strike of the year, and it was made particularly momentous by the arrival of 16-year-old Swedish activist Greta Thunberg in New York City, which drew a crowd of approximately 300,000 people. The global turnout was over four million, which made this the largest climate rally ever.

Here in Chicago, we went into the morning expecting around 300 students and supporters—but the turnout was almost 3,000. What was meant to be a march easily contained to the sidewalks became a massive demonstration cutting off major roads and traffic. 

Friday was a beautiful day in the mid-70s, perfect weather for the mile-long march. At the intersection of Columbus and Roosevelt, where the crowd gathered, teens, young kids, and their parents circled around the Columbus statue. There had been three days of art builds organized by the IL Climate Strike team and Greenpeace, which meant wonderful and colorful banners and signs of varying size. There were also many other homemade signs, clever cardboard protest signs bearing the messages like “the wrong Amazon is burning” and “I’ve seen better cabinets at Ikea.”

My friends and I carried the bright yellow Ready for 100 Signs, blank spaces filled with “WE ARE Ready for 100.” As we began our walk to Federal Plaza, the energy in the crowd only increased, along with chants and drums which rippled its way through the streets. At one point, a group of elementary school students holding hands in a long line passed through us, with their teacher in the front pulling them along so they wouldn’t get lost among us. They were so young and inspiring and it made me hope desperately that by the time they become juniors or seniors in high school, they won’t need to march again for the right to breathe.

Once we turned from Columbus Drive onto the streets of downtown Chicago, walking under the L and between skyscrapers, our chants got louder, and our collective energy grew, demanding the attention of those watching us from the windows of their offices, asking for passersby on the sidewalks to join us, and as we shouted phrases like “What do we want? Climate justice! When do we want it? Now!”, I couldn’t help but feel optimistic about our future. We were capable of organizing this, we were capable of organizing much more, and it felt like we finally had the power to get decision-makers to listen to us. 

Once at Federal Plaza, we rallied. Speakers challenged us to continue to fight back against the political complacency, all while recognizing the intersectionality of climate activism. Fellow student activists said that we would do this again, because our future isn’t up for negotiation. The message was clear: We are all in this together. 

We realized there was a need for collaboration and work after the strike, in order to push forward the momentum of the event. In preparation for this, and after asking the IL Youth Climate Strike team how to best support them, I created Ready for 100 flyers asking for youth involvement as well as a half-page informational flyer with a list of organizations young people could get plugged into post-strike. We made 150 copies of both flyers, and I went around asking other students: “Would you like to learn more about ways to get involved after this strike?” The answer always came back a resounding “yes!” 

For adults who doubted the ability of young people to be passionate about an issue or questioned the dedication of these youth activists, there was no clearer proof than this past Friday that we had the momentum behind us and the power within ourselves to make them listen anyways. The work continues on October 7 with the sit-in at City Hall organized by Extinction Rebellion and the IL Youth Climate Strike team.