BY SCOTT SULLIVAN
EDITOR
Saugatuck-Douglas doesn’t lack water resources. Nor fluid and fluent thinkers. Among younger ones, 18 Saugatuck High School Advanced Placement English students Feb. 1 entered the Grand Rapids Economic Club’s 2022-23 High School Essay Contest about a subject that’s all around them:
“As water scarcity impacts human sustainability, what responsibility does Michigan (and the other Great Lakes basin states) have to the rest of the country?” the contest asks.
The club in March will award $3,000, $2,000 and $1,000 first- through third-place prizes, all including YMCA teen memberships; plus 10 more $500 fourth-place stipends.
“It was an interesting exercise for our students,” said AP language and composition teacher Mike Shaw.
“They had to write 1,500-to 2,500-word persuasive essays drawing on source texts and crafting good arguments conscious of who their audience was. That’s a key part in understanding and using rhetoric.
“No submissions can have been published before, but maybe we can share some after. Even better, one or more of ours could win.”
Formed in 1976, the now 1,000 plus-member Grand Rapids Economics Club is comprised of persons interested in and contributing to the economic health of the Grand Rapids area.
Its 15-some semi-monthly meetings furnish forums to learn about and discuss current events and meet other present and future local leaders.
Annual dinners have hosted keynote speakers including former U.S. presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, British prime ministers Margaret Thatcher and John Major, world leaders F.W. de Klerk of South Africa, Shimon Peres of Israel and Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan, U.S. Secretaries of State Colin Powell, Condoleeza Rice, Hillary Rodham Clinton and Madeleine Albright, late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and rock singer Bono.
Shaw’s class prepared hearing guest speakers Scott Dean of the Michigan Environment, Great Lakes and Energy department, also now Saugatuck mayor; and Brian King, founder of the Holland-based 501c3 Vox, whose freshwater efforts include digging wells in Africa.
“Not everyone has fresh water available to them,” Shaw said. “The Great Lakes basin does. Who controls or owns it? What
responsibilities do we have? “It’s worth thinking about,” he said. “Our young people did and delivered,” he said.