On November 14th, The Walden School in Media, PA, recieved their certificate declaring them a Fair Trade school! This makes The Walden School the first Fair Trade elementary school in the nation!  The next day Dr. Guertin, Aimee Ralph, Lavanya Mookerjee, Zanya Stephenson, and I (Louis Donaghue) stopped by to give The Walden School’s students a presentation on Fair Trade. Once we got to the school, we found out that not only would we be presenting to the students, but that Hal Taussig would also be attending our presentation. Hal (seen in the photo below with our Nittany Lion) has been at the front of the Fair Trade movement in America since day one, and he is the reason Media, PA, is the first Fair Trade town in America. There certainly was a large amount of pressure added to our presenters due to Hal’s pressence, but it was really a honor to meet him and show him the impact of his hard work in his community.

The format of our presentation at The Walden School was to do a skit where Dr. Guertin was the teacher and the rest of us were students in her class, and that day was Fair Trade Show and Tell. We each brought in a Fair Trade product to talk about. First, Lavanya brought in a Dolma Fair Trade scarf and some jewelry made from the tagua nut by Minga Fair Trade Imports, then Aimee came in wearing her favorite banana suit to talk about Fair Trade bananas. Next, I came in with a Senda Athletics Fair Trade soccer ball, and lastly, the Nittany Lion arrived to hand out stickers we custom made. The kids were great and asked some fantastic questions about Fair Trade.

Thanks to everyone at Walden School for letting us visit and talk to your awesome students. We are very happy to have another Fair Trade school in the area! And thank you to Hal Taussig for coming out to see us – you made this experience even more special.

Contributed by Louis Donaghue, Fair Trade Intern