Ripley-Union-Lewis-Huntington Middle School student, Marleana Highfield is presented with a certificate for winning the Ohio GFWC State Essay Contest. Presenting the certificate is essay chairman Carol Stivers.
Marleana Highfield has won the state seventh grade essay contest titled: The Bees and Me – How We Help Each Other Out.
The contest is part of the Ohio General Federation of Women’s Clubs Environmental Service Program. Highfield, a 2022-2023 seventh grade student at the Ripley-Union-Lewis-Huntington Middle School, entered the essay contest sponsored by the GFWC/Ripley Women’s Club and won first place. Her essay was then sent on to the GFWC District Contest and then to the state contest where each time it won first place. Highfield received certificates and monetary gifts. She is the daughter of Kayla Disney. The GFWC/Ripley Women’s Club is very proud of Marleana Highfield.
Following is part of her winning essay:
The Bees and Me – How We Help Each Other Out
Bees are dying all over the world. This is important because if all the bees die then the plants wouldn’t be pollinated, and if the plants don’t get pollinated then we could go into a food shortage. Most foods that we eat are pollinated by bees.
The bees are dying because they are abandoning their hives after they were destroyed, so they had nowhere to live. Current scientific research indicates that parasites and the diseases they carry, are the main threat to the lives of honey bees. Weakened immune systems leave hives susceptible to bacterial and viral diseases as well. Also, the farmers have been plowing up the wildflowers and pesticide use is massively increased.
There are many reasons why we need bees. We need bees to pollinate our plants so we wouldn’t have a food shortage. Bees help with many forms of life. also, bees help make some medicine. Bees even help law enforcement; they were fitted with sensors to detect explosives.
Bees are dying all over the world. We can help the bees by stopping plowing up wildflowers and stop using pesticides. We can buy local raw honey to help support beekeepers and their honey.
