On Thursday, Oct. 26, The Office of Sustainability and the WKU Center for Citizenship and Social Justice hosted a showing of the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth Sequel: Truth to Power,” which ended with a live Q&A with former Vice President Al Gore.

“An Inconvenient Truth Sequel: Truth to Power” is the second of Al Gore’s documentaries about his fight and his process for advocating. Al Gore, the former Vice President during the Clinton administration, is one of the leading advocates against climate change. He is the founder and current chair of the Alliance for Climate Protection, which encourages civic action against climate change.

Gore’s documentary discussed the struggles of discussing climate change in the political universe.

“To spend time on the climate crisis, we need to fix the democracy crisis,” Gore said.

With Trump’s announcement of the U.S.’s departure of the Paris Climate Agreement back in June of this year, politics and its affect on climate change has been on topic.

“Even though Trump says we’re out of the Paris agreement, many states in the U.S. say we’re still in. The break doesn’t take into effect until the next presidential election, so hopefully…,” Gore said.

His Q&A was aimed towards students, with men and women from multiple colleges sending in questions. One of the most prevalent questions was how students could make an impact with the movement.

“Historically, college students are the most important voices in any movement. In every movement, from civil rights to gay marriage, college students were mainly in the forefront,” Gore said.

He said he encourages students to raise their voices and vote. Gore said to start off with encouraging your town, city or even your campus to switch to renewable energy.

“Students need to organize and petition, putting pressure on the university to make a change,” he said. “The younger generation will scream, ‘What were you thinking? Couldn’t you hear what the scientists were saying? Couldn’t you hear what mother nature was screaming?'”

The Center for Citizenship and Social Justice is hosting another event called Embracing Our Elephants, which will be a student discussion of climate change. It takes place on Nov. 16, from 4-8 p.m. in the multipurpose room of HCIC. To sign up for the event, go to wku.edu/ccsj.

Reporter Jessica Kiehnau can be reached by her Twitter @JessKeyno.