The Truckee High School Envirolution Club’s innovative Trashion Show is part runway fashion show and part environmental education. Though it’s now an annual highlight of the Village at Squaw Valley’s Earth Day, the Trashion Show is not just a one-day event. This year the club has been getting its message out to elementary and middle school students across the school district with the shows, which are sprinkled with pop culture, modern music, conservation tools, and a lot of creativity.
Envirolution Club students work for months before the show designing and crafting their costumes, each made out of trash. From discarded holiday lights, old magazines, garbage bags, and bubble wrap, to newspaper and shopping bags, creativity and high style abound. Each strut down the catwalk comes with a different message about environmental stewardship, recycling, and conservation as the children in the audience sit captivated.
After each show and assembly, every student in attendance receives a free conservation kit from the Truckee Donner Public Utility District that includes a 12-pack of compact fluorescent light bulbs, a low-flow shower head, faucet aerators, a shower timer, LED night lights, a toilet leak detection kit, foam insulation for hot water pipes, and instructions on how to use the kit in their homes. Also included is information on how to enter the Truckee Green Challenge. The Envirolution Club is sponsored by Sierra Watershed Education Partnerships (SWEP), and the Trashion shows receive support from the Town of Truckee, Teichert, and the TDPUD.
The Envirolution Club will perform at Tahoe Truckee Earth Day on April 24 at the Village at Squaw Valley at 2:15 p.m. Learn more about Envirolution at envirolution.org.
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