It is 2016, and 500 species go extinct every year.

Why is it that in a time where we are rapidly looking for cures to cancer and on constant search for preventions to everyday problems such as bullying, lack of clean water and how to keep ourselves healthy we can’t spend a little more time working on this problem?

This issue came to my attention when I learned more in depth about just how much of a problem it is.

As I asked around to my peers, friends and teachers, I saw that they also are unaware of this massive epidemic.

Dimond High School Sophomore Racquel Micheletto said, “I know that the idea of endangered species is becoming more and more of an issue, but I’m not sure how I personally would solve it so I can’t blame other people for not working at solving this at the moment.”

Following Micheletto’s opinion on why this problem isn’t being focused on, substitute teacher Jean Wight said, “I think more people refer to the issue as the natural progression of life because they don’t fully understand how humans impact it.”

Along with the idea of the natural progression being the cause behind the issue, Micheletto said, “Although it may be partially the progression of life, I think humans have a large part in the disappearing of all these species.”

Marcus Reese, Honors English 2 teacher at Dimond High School, said, “Humans play a role in this issue because we constantly are expanding our factories and always finding reasons to utilize more space.”

Which is absolutely true.

One of the main causes behind all of these species dying off is that they are losing their homes due to humans forcefully occupying the land they live on.

The main question is: Why does this matter? How are we going to be affected by their deaths?

Micheletto said, “I don’t know if the deaths of these animals necessarily affect me but it affects the food chain and I know when one species of plant dies, that leads to the possible  death of another animal who eats it, and as that domino effect occurs, it can lead to bigger problems which may end up affecting humans.”

Dimond High School teacher Brett Roth said “We can’t forget about fungi and bacteria because they’re all worthy and you never know where the next re-genetic discovery is going to come from and by that I mean so many medicines have come from species we see as inconsequential.”

Although we can point fingers all we want about who is to blame this issue on, ultimately it’s more important to focus on how we are going to solve this issue.

Many people had different ideas on how we can strive to solve this issue.

“I believe we as a community should begin spreading awareness so that the people around us are aware and with that kind of positive environment of everyone knowing animals are going extinct we can start to gather ideas and work together to pick up trash and do what we can to help,” Micheletto said.

“People are doing all they can to save the animals, but we could definitely start preserving their natural habitats better,” said Wight.

“We need to alarm people that this is a problem and use methods that people will care about, such as a picture of a cute animal or something that will attract attention,” Reese said.

“Humans need to do a better job of protecting habitat, particularly critical habitat like the tropical rain forests, coral reefs, and really biodiverse areas,” said Roth

We need to start being the productive humans we are capable to be and work to save the endangered animals, plants, fungi and bacteria.

The first step starts with being aware of the problem. What happens next is up to you.