I am lucky enough to have witnessed many national parks in my lifetime, from the high peaks and breathtaking views of the Rocky Mountains, seeing molten lava at Hawai’i Volcanoes, to the crashing waves and rugged coast of Acadia. These parks are an amazing contribution to our country, and we need to preserve and protect them.
Many people find nature to be very comforting and relaxing, both mentally and physically. As stated in an article released by the University of Minnesota titled “Taking Charge of Your Health & Wellbeing,” “Exposure to nature not only makes you feel better emotionally, it contributes to your physical well being, reducing blood pressure, heart rate, muscle tension, and the production of stress hormones.”
Being in nature is beneficial to your body and mind, which makes trips to national parks much more beneficial than trips to places such as Disney. If the parks had more funding, more people could visit and feel the positive effects of these beautiful sanctuaries.
In the same fashion, we should also look at how many people are visiting national parks. According to the United States National Park Service, or NPS, “In 2017, the National Park Service received nearly 331 million recreation visits.”
An astounding number of people visit national parks every year, not just from the United States, but from countries around the world as well. The number of people who are changed by experiences in the national parks is only growing; the budget for the national parks needs to grow as well, to accommodate these numbers. If we don’t support the parks, those secluded getaways might disappear.
Equally important is how national parks change our interaction with the world. As said by Sean Smith, a former National Park Ranger, “Parks have the ability to break down differences—to allow us to see similarities and create common ground, and it’s those values that are the first step toward understanding someone else’s point of view and creating empathy.”
National parks are unexpectedly a way for us to connect to other people all around the world. Millions of people visit the national parks every year, and visiting them helps us connect to others whom we wouldn’t normally connect with, consequently creating bonds and seeing the world from a different point of view. If we do that, we are already on track to overcoming our differences and this will lead to solutions for problems to come. We need to preserve this, not just for ourselves, but for the the generations to come.
Lastly, national parks help not just the visitors of the parks, but the communities as well. As stated in “The Advantages of National Parks,” “It is also helpful that many national park units are located in what President Lyndon Johnson called ‘pockets of poverty.’ These are generally rural areas with declining industries such as mining, logging, or marginal agriculture, with low educational outcomes and a high proportion of jobs that are seasonal in nature and close to minimum wage when available.”
National parks are often located in or near poverty stricken areas. Fortunately, national parks offer jobs for locals, as well as bringing tourism to their communities, which helps support the local businesses in the area. An increased budget for the parks would support the economy of these areas. Increasing funding for our national parks would help the people who live by the parks.
Some young adults might say that our money would be better spent in other places such as military, education, roads, or in other government areas. However, the natural environment changes so many lives for the better, and we can’t just ignore this. According to the Constitution Center Blog, the Park Service gets an annual budget of $2.6 billion.
However, the Park Service supports around 240,000 local jobs, and generates about $27 billion for the United States Economy.
National parks have a much bigger impact on our economy than most people realize. They are very important to the United States, and though they are not currently a priority, we need to make them one.
Our national parks are doing amazing things for our country, and these inspiring sites need us to protect and preserve them for years to come, or else they will be doomed to slowly fade from thoughts and existence.
Clarkston Junior High eighth grade ELA students wrote opinion articles focused on increasing activism within our community, state, and world. The top six were submitted to The Clarkston News for publication.