Senior Maddy Chong is heavily involved in the Fossil Ridge High School community and is constantly working to make the world a better place through her dedication to clubs and the environment. She explained, “I’m Co-President of FRESH Club, on Academic Council and all the honor societies in it which is NHS, SNHS, NAHS, and I’m on the board of Mu Alpha Theta. I’m also in Science Olympiad.”

Chong spends the vast majority of her time within the walls of Fossil, in and out of school hours. “I would rather spend my time with people than at home in my room. I am more productive at school like if I go home I’ll probably take a nap. In the downtime that I do have, because the reality is that I spend most of my time at school, I’m usually watching Netflix or sleeping. I love going to sports events and events that they hold at the library or in Old Town,” she added.

Though her deep involvement may seem overwhelming, Chong explained that the clubs have been the the best part of her high school experience, with “Clubs are what I would rather do. I reward myself with working on them after doing homework. I do a lot of things and I like to be a leader.”

Chong identifies the environment as her greatest passion. “The environment is the most worthy cause because the reality is everyone on this Earth is going to die at some point but the Earth is here for millions and millions of years and in the span of a couple thousand we’ve managed to kill it so much. I don’t think it’s enough to just sit back and watch things get worse when we have so much capability to make it get better,” says Chong. “Anything we can do to help is what we should do.”

One of Chong’s major concerns with environmental negligence is the use of plastic. “I’m the Plastic Police…I don’t like excess use of single-use plastic so plastic bags, plastic bottle, plastic straws, packaging. Last year I started an environmental campaign about straws so have it be noted that I beat the whole straw fad. On a day to day basis Americans alone use 900 million straws. An average citizens encounters them, uses them, and can avoid them,” she expressed.

“I just think it’s so easy to have a reusable water bottle in your car or to buy a two dollar reusable straw or to have vinyl bags,” Chong commented.

She urges her classmates to be kind in all that they do, adding “Be aware of how your actions impact the world around you, whether that’s with people or the environment or objects. Everything we do has an effect and we should try to make it positive. If you’re going to talk to someone, try to leave it on a good note or leave an area cleaner than you found it.”