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Education Essay
Upon first hearing about global climate change or at last realizing the
true severity of the situation, it is not uncommon for one to begin doing their
own personal research, likely resulting in pages of websites about what you
can do to stop global warming and how to reduce your carbon footprint.
While doing your own part to help the planet is indeed important, you are not
going to fix global warming simply by driving a hybrid. In order to stop
global climate change, we must get back to the true source of the problem
humans. I speak of the somewhat underestimated issue of overpopulation.
Overpopulation refers to the state in which a population exceeds the
carrying capacity of its inhabited region (The population explosion, 1990). This
can be a serious issue because this state of being oftentimes leads people to
rapidly deplete local natural resources, causing a lack of food, water, and
fossil fuels and an excess of people, pollution, and atmospheric levels of
carbon dioxide (United States Census Bureau). Worst of all, the overpopulation
crisis is self-sustaining, as population tends to naturally grow at an
exponential rate. Although several nations have begun to reduce growing
population into a stabilized or even declining state, many others are still
expanding at an accelerating pace. In fact, the Earth as a whole is currently
overpopulated by approximately two billion. Currently Africa and the Middle
East are the worst offenders here, and these two regions also happen to
have significantly lower literacy rates than the countries whose populations
are beginning to stabilize or decline (Literacy Rates - World Statistics and Charts
as Map, Diagram and Table). It only seems reasonable, then, that we may infer
that a correlation exists between the two. Given this, the next logical step in
attempting to reduce overpopulation and thereby reduce the effects of global
climate change as well, is to ensure that at least fundamental education
(especially sexual education) is available worldwide.
It is estimated that up to 40% of pregnancies worldwide are
unintended (Cliodynamics). While this number may in part be due to
improper use of contraceptives or contraceptives failing, a large part of it is
still due to lack of information regarding birth control, or lack of access to
birth control resources. Even in the United States, often considered one of
the more developed countries in the world, the teenage pregnancy rate is
surprisingly high. Nearly 750,000 American teenagers become pregnant
each year, with 82% of these pregnancies being unintended (Reducing
Teenage Pregnancy). However, despite these seemingly large numbers,
teenage pregnancy in the United States is lower than it has been since the
1940s, and research has shown that this is likely due in part to an increase in
contraceptive use and a delayed initiation of sex as well, coming about as a
result of an increase in sexual education in the United States over the last
several decades (Effective Sex Education.). By making an effort to implement
similar awareness campaigns throughout the world, especially in lesser
developed countries, we may help reduce population growth over the next
several decades.
acquire a secondary education is admittedly more easily said than done, but
as it has the potential to be a fairly simple solution to a very complex
problem, the effort required to get it in motion is very much worth it.
In conclusion, global climate change is a huge problem that is not to be
taken lightly. However, given its immensity, it is not something which can be
fixed overnight, either. To make progress toward solving global climate
change, we must make a global effort to put a greater emphasis on the
Citations:
"Global Climate Change: Effects." Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet. NASA,
n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2015. <http://climate.nasa.gov/effects/>.
"Global Climate Change: Causes." Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet. NASA,
n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2015. <http://climate.nasa.gov/causes/>.
Biello, David. "10 Solutions for Climate Change." Scientific American Global RSS.
Scientific American, 26 Nov. 2007. Web. 30 Apr. 2015.
<http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/10-solutions-for-climate-change/>.
Ehrlich, Paul R. Ehrlich & Anne H. (1990). The population explosion. London:
Hutchinson. pp. 3940. ISBN 0091745519.
"United States Census Bureau." International Programs. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Apr.
2015. <http://www.census.gov/population/international/>.
"Literacy Rates - World Statistics and Charts as Map, Diagram and Table."Literacy
Rates / Countries of the World. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2015.
<http://world.bymap.org/LiteracyRates.html>.
"Cliodynamics." - Introduction to Social Macrodynamics: Secular Cycles and
Millennial Trends. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2015. <http://cliodynamics.ru/index.php?
option=com_content&task=view&id=172&Itemid=70>.
"Reducing Teenage Pregnancy." REDUCING TEENAGE PREGNANCY (n.d.): n.
pag. Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood. Web.
<http://www.plannedparenthood.org/files/6813/9611/7632/Reducing_Teen_Pregnanc
y.pdf>.
"Effective Sex Education." Effective Sex Education. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2015.
<http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/component/content/article/450-effective-sexeducation>.
"Secondary Education for Females: A Primary Way to Prevent
Overpopulation." Harvard College Global Health Review. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Apr.
2015. <http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/hghr/online/secondary-education-women/>.