As summer temps soar across the Midwest so does youth climate activism as momentum grows at an exponential pace across the region. Power Shift 2011 was revealing as Midwest youth participation made up almost a quarter of the 10,000 youth in attendance. But if Power Shift is the indicator, youth themselves are the cause. The Midwest is home to many of the most influential young visionaries in the youth climate movement today and several of the youth initiatives and programs that have been building over the past several years have started to catch fire.

At a glance, the Midwest hosts two of the most exciting programs in country. The ripple effect from Summer of Solutions, launched in 2008 by Grand Aspirations (a youth start-up non-profit based in St Paul, MN), can be felt across the U.S. What began as a local initiative has grown to include 16 youth-run summer programs across the country, including Minneapolis, Detroit, Cleveland and Iowa City. Not only are youth implementing clean energy solutions on the ground, they are also building new partnerships with local businesses, schools, community members, and local policy makers, and creating the green jobs vital to the transition to a clean energy economy. This focus on 'sustainable cities' parallels a growing focus area for Midwest environmental non-profits and foundations and lends itself to exciting cross-generational collaboration. The Will Steger Foundation is proud to play a role in fostering these connections through our Emerging Leaders Program.

The Ohio Student Environmental Coalition (OSEC) is another hot spot on the youth climate map. Currently funded through the Energy Action Coalition and fiscally sponsored by Global Exchange, OSEC has grown in leaps and bounds over the past year. Funding for a full-time Coordinator position has made a huge difference, and enable to statewide network to expand include more schools and a wider range of projects. Perhaps most exciting is the OSEC Don't Frack with Ohio campaign. Student organizers are working closely with community groups and non-profit partners to host strategic meetings across the state. The meetings have had strong turn out and drawn interest from local/state policy makers. The Coalition is also running several other campaigns including the Lake Erie Off-Shore Wind Project, Ohio Beyond Coal, and Smart Transportation for a Smart Generation. OSEC is currently one of the largest and most effective statewide youth network in the country, and is a valuable example of what a well-structured and effective youth network can look like. Janina Klimas, OSEC Coordinator, is also taking the lead in planning Midwest Power Shift, to be held Oct. 7-9 at Cleveland State University.

While these two programs are making an impact on the wider youth movement, youth orgs and programs across the Midwest are hard at work this summer, sweating it out on a variety of issues. WISPIRG is holding Wisconsin Gov. Walker's feet to fire drawing attention to his spending on new roads vs. investment in existing infrastructure and clean transportation options, along with a new community weatherization program. MPIRG is working actively at the municipal level on solid waste legislation as part of their Greener Minneapolis program. National Wildlife Federation, based in Michigan, is continuing it's outreach to community colleges on green jobs training through their Greenforce Initiative. The Sierra Student Coalition welcomed a new Director this spring and just wrapped up their annual Midwest youth training (SPROG) in Indiana this July.

By Cecelia Watkins

The Twin Cities Summer of Solutions program is and initiative of Grand Aspirations and focused on working in low income neighborhoods to build a green economy where it is most needed. The program is entirely youth run and committed to the principles of social entrepreneurship and anti-oppression in the course of building the green economy. There are sixteen Summer of Solutions programs currently underway across the US.

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As you may have experienced, the traditional bike shop model goes like this: you, the melancholy owner of a sticky geared, no shifting, wheel-missing, untrue, spoke popped, flat tire, screechy brake broken mess of metal (or who knows, maybe you just want a tune up), enter the shop and drop off your bicycle with the shop mechanics. You wait, maybe leave to take a stroll or run some errands. You come back and voila! Magically, your bike is fixed. You pay up for the services and walk out of the store. Your bike is fixed, yes, but beyond that all you’ve gained is a lighter wallet.

This is how it works at Sibley Bike Depot: You enter the building and roll your bike down a sweet-smelling hallway between a donut shop and a fabric store. Ten feet in you’ve passed these window front stores, and suddenly a colorful world of bikes opens before you. To your right is the sales floor, where Sibley sells used bikes and parts at affordable prices. To your left is the shop floor. You wheel your bike in, sign up on the list, and sit down for a short wait - Sibley is often throbbing with community members eager to work on their bikes—but luckily there are nice couches and stools made of tree stumps for you to wait on. While you wait you chat with the other people there, maybe about bikes, maybe about donuts, maybe about something totally unrelated. Eventually your name is called, and you bring your bike over to a stand. Here an experienced volunteer or staff person helps you figure out what’s wrong with your bike and walks you through the steps in fixing it. Unless you need a replacement part, this service is entirely free (and even the replacement parts are wonderfully cheap). When you leave the shop you’ve gained so much more than a working bike: you’ve gained new knowledge of bike repairs and along with it a sense of personal empowerment. And your wallet feels about the same as when you entered.

Sibley Bike Depot is a community run, non-profit bike shop whose mission is to make biking accessible and fun for everyone. On Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday Sibley holds Open Shop, as described above, and Tuesday nights are a special open shop time only for people identifying as women or transgendered. Every Monday night at Sibley volunteers of all ability levels come together to repair donated and abandoned bikes, many of which are then given at no charge to participants in the Earn-A-Bike program, where anyone can volunteer for 20 hours to get their own working bike. Sibley also runs many other programs including many free classes for youth and adults, and a 6-month bike rental program.

But why is biking important? If you’re reading this blog you may already have a sense, but I’ll spout my thoughts anyway, just in case you aren’t yet sold. Biking allows us to move ourselves and whatever we can hook up to our bikes (panniers, backpacks, milk crates full of groceries, furniture or kids or whatever else in a trailer) in a way that is faster than walking but also not reliant on rapidly disappearing fossil fuels. It promotes healthy bodies and healthy spirits, combating obesity and a vast array of other health problems. It promotes connection to and interaction with the neighborhoods one bikes through, thus supporting local business and building community. It provides us with the independence of mobility without the ever-more-expensive costs of gas, car insurance, pollution and environmental degradation.

Why is Sibley’s model of inclusion, empowerment and accessibility important? Because for cycling to be a viable solution to our nation’s massive transportation problems, it needs to be exciting and accessible for every single person, regardless of their background. For me to truly trust my bicycle as a method of transportation in addition to recreation, I needed to have a basic knowledge of how my bike works and a baseline faith that I can flip it and fix it on the side of the road if something goes wrong.

Okay, so what you’ve been waiting for: an update of what Summer of Solutions Twin Cities is doing with Sibley. This summer we have two groups working with Sibley Bike Depot. One group is focused on figuring out how to both improve the volunteer experience at Sibley and better coordinate volunteers. We have compiled a list of almost 400 volunteer emails and phone numbers and have reached out to them to gain their feedback via an online survey. The responses have already been pouring in and we are working to tabulate the data to present recommendations for improvement to the Sibley staff and board of directors. We are also working to completely re-vamp the volunteer interest and hour tracking system to make it functional and useful. In addition to this, our efforts are leading to the first-ever volunteer newsletter which will highlight upcoming volunteer opportunities, events, and feature a Volunteer of the Month.

The other Sibley group is working on outreach and visibility. In this group, we are promoting and staffing the Sibley booth at community events such as the Rondo Days celebration and the Como Park Bike Tour. At these events we talked to people about Sibley and bicycling in general, networked with other cycling organizations, taught people how to fix flat tires, and generated excitement by holding speed-based Change-a-Tire competitions. We’ve also worked on a number of new fliers for Sibley and have re-decorated the entry space with better signage. We’ve also been doing community outreach by going door-to-door in the nearby Frogtown neighborhood in St Paul, talking with community members about bicycling and letting them know about all the great opportunities Sibley offers.

In recent weeks we have also worked to promote group bike rides with the Major Taylor Bicycling Club of Minnesota, the premier African-American cycling group in the Twin Cities. Last weekend we went on a great ride with them before the Rondo Days Celebration, and then we rode next to them and the Sibley youth apprentices in the Rondo Days Parade!

So what are you waiting for? Get on your bike and ride!

The power of the Millennial generation is not that we have Facebook or that we know how to use it. It's that growing up in a networked world is allowing us to imagine and equipping us to implement people-oriented coordination of real-world action at a massive scale. At the center of this story is that all of us - regardless of age - are creators, that we have the tools, the ability, and the skill to create beautiful outcomes that had seemed impossible through our coordination.