Persuasive Essay Intros

All classes worked on writing a persuasive essay. Some students chose to attempt to persuade the community to make changes so that we can lessen our impact on the "greenhouse effect" and others elected to persuade their peers to lessen their plastic usage on campus.

Below are some of the best introduction paragraphs that were written. Take a moment to read through the intros. Once you have read them, think about your own introduction. Then leave a comment explaining what you could learn from reading your peers's introduction paragraphs.

"The students at Point Loma High School need to do their part to get rid of plastic. One reason is because it can go into the sewer system that leads into streams, rivers, bays, and the oceans. Then if floats with the current to the North Pacific Gyre where it will photodegrade for centuries. Plastic is harmful to the environment for two reasons. The first reason is plastic harms the wildlife and the second reason is plastic photodegrades instead of biodegrading. The North Pacific Gyre has so much plastic that it is twice as big as Texas (which is the biggest state in the United States). This plastic area is not a solid mound of trash, rather it is a whole bunch of little pieces of plastic and other things like tires, nets, plastic globs, and pieces of plastic that are just below the surface. This area is not just full of plastic, it is full of chemicals too." -T. Boswell

"There are many things destroying the earth we live on today. One of those things is due to the continuous use of plastic. Plastic is used in many sorts of ways, it is used to keep food sealed and fresh, it is used to make many kids of toys for both children and adults, and most of all we use plastic to bottle most of our liquids. However plastic may be very useful in our community today, but most plastic is not as recyclable as you think. There is no doubt that plastic is piling up in our ocean more and more everyday, contains deadly chemicals that could possibly kill us, and also plastic will never go away after it is produced. The fact of the matter is that our school and community need to cut down on the use of plastic. Some of the ways our school and community could take steps to reduce the use of plastic are by using more aluminum and paper goods, not buying liquids in plastic containers, and also by not purchasing plastic toys." - R. Da Rosa


"Plastic is everywhere: from plastic bags to water bottles. Each year every person tosses out 185lbs. of plastics and some of that plastic ends up in the ocean. In the North Pacific Ocean there is a 10 million square mile gyre filled with plastic objects. this plastic is harmful to the environment. The fish eat this plastic and die. Students at Point Loma High can stop this by reducing, reusing, and recycling." - A. Cardenas

"Humans make a great impact on greenhouse gases. We need to take steps to conclude this greatly affected issue. It is my belief that cars, power plants, and the meat industry are greatly causing this problem. I believe that we can fix this issue but its up to the people in our community and the world to do so also." - B. Keenan

"I don't know about everyone else, but I know I don't want to die because of plastic. We are killing ourselves and we don't even realize it. Plastic is a daily issue in our American society, although sooner or later it will be a deadly usage. as a teenager there's plenty of things I can do to reduce the use of plastic. In my perspective, believe there's many ways people in this world can contribute to reduce the use of plastic in order to improve the health of our planet and ourselves." - L. Anaya

"Looking at the world and all its garbage, I can feel nothing but disgust and shame. I can't go one place now that doesn't have trash (mostly plastic) everywhere. Trash is scattered through out my community and probably yours too. Its at my school, its at the parks. Don't you find this disgusting? When you throw that "harmless" water bottle on the ground do you actually know where it ends up? In the ocean. But there is a solution to this. We can stop this but I need your help. Some methods we students can use to reduce our use in plastics are to recycle, don't litter, reduce our purchases of plastic, and just care about the rest of the world that we are destroying." R. Bowers