The South Whidbey School District will soon be the recipient of a new electric school bus, thanks to a federal grant Vice President Kamala Harris announced Wednesday in Seattle.

South Whidbey High School junior Audrey Gmerek introduced the vice president in a brief speech before a crowd of around 300 people, including several prominent state and federal officials, at the press event Oct. 26 at Lumen Field.

The Environmental Protection Agency’s new Clean School Bus Initiative, funded by the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, will invest around $5 billion in zero- and low-emission buses in school districts across the country over the next five fiscal years. The electric bus coming to South Whidbey schools is just one of around 2,500 awarded in the first billion-dollar round of funding through the program.

South End-based youth climate action coalition United Student Leaders, of which Gmerek is a member, encouraged the school district to apply, organization members said. The EPA received around 2,000 applications, requesting nearly $4 billion for more than 12,000 buses.

South Whidbey School District received a $395,000 rebate for its electric bus. Gmerek said in her remarks that she hopes this will be “the first of many” such buses to come to the district.

As a rural community, South Whidbey Island students rely heavily on yellow school buses to get to campus, she said, but the diesel buses used up to this point have a negative health impact on students.

“Transitioning from fossil fuel buses to clean energy is a step in the right direction towards ensuring a prosperous future for younger generations, but it cannot be our last,” she said.

Gmerek then welcomed Vice President Harris, who said that the school bus system is the most expansive mass transit system in the country. The school bus system’s impact ripples through the fields of industry, education and health, she said.

“This bus symbolizes so much about our collective investment in our future,” Harris said, “because, of course, it is about our investment in our children, in their health and in their education.”

The vice president praised youth leaders for their efforts and involvement.

Gmerek was joined at the event by five other South Whidbey High School and Middle School students: Jackson Murphy, Torrey Green, Kjersti Ringsrus, Lily Cerda and Juniper Murray, as well as Superintendent Jo Moccia and other district officials and parents.

Green said being in the room with top state leaders, including Gov. Jay Inslee and Sen. Patty Murray, was an experience she will never forget.

“It never ceases to amaze me the impact that youth leaders have on the people with positions of power — and the effect that that will have on the rest of the world,” she said. “Change is possible, and we are initiating the conversations for that change today.”

Photos provided South Whidbey High School student Audrey Gmerek meets Vice President Kamala Harris at a press conference on the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean School Bus Initiative.