Trees for Degrees

ROMEO GACAD/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

GROWING MOVEMENT: A Boy Scout troop in the Philippines plants trees as part of a reforestation campaign.

For kids in the Philippines, getting good grades might not be enough to graduate. The Pacific island nation has a new law: A student must plant 10 trees before he or she can graduate from elementary school, middle school, high school, or college.

Agricultural practices, logging, and urban development in the Philippines have caused severe deforestation. But the new policy could help replant 175 million trees every year, says Gary Alejano, the congressman who drafted the law. He adds that the trees would become the students’ living legacy to the environment and future generations.

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