educ 2 bak

7/17 bak<div>
</div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">3/17 disambiguation link</font><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">this is for RW propaganda injected into public schools</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">mostly AGW FF bs, but includes creationism</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">3/17 disambiguation link</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div>
</div><div>this is for RW propaganda injected into public schools</div><div>mostly AGW FF bs, but includes creationism</div><div>=</div><div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">=</font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><a href="https://www.drilledpodcast.com/s7-the-abcs-of-big-oil/">https://www.drilledpodcast.com/s7-the-abcs-of-big-oil/</a></font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">no lnx</font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" /><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">S7: The ABCs of Big Oil</font></div><div>Big Oil infiltrated schools across the country. Earther and Drilled take you inside the campaign to miseducate American students.</div><div>
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</div><div>Ep 1: The First Day of School</div><div>Fossil fuel companies didn't start infiltrating schools when climate change appeared on the scene, they were there shaping the minds of future citizens for decades before then. The industry has been laying the groundwork for inaction on climate since long before this crisis reared its ugly head, limiting how Americans are allowed to think about the environment and the economy. In this first episode of our new miniseries we look at how Big Oil first got into the education game, and why it worked so well. Transcript</div><div>
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</div><div>Ep 2: Elementary School</div><div>Since the 1920s, oil companies have been creating music, activities, coloring books, comic books, movies and more to shape how American kids think about society, the economy, and the environment. Today, we look at their efforts in elementary school. Transcript</div><div>
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</div><div>Ep 3: High School</div><div>In the third episode of our mini-series with Earther, we head to high school, where the fossil fuel industry's efforts to shape Americans' thinking on economics and policy really ramps up. Transcript</div><div>
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</div><div>Ep 4: We're Going Streaking</div><div>We're wrapping up our series with Earther this week, with a look at how fossil fuel companies influence curricula and research at the university level.  Transcript</div><div>
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</div><div>Ep 5: Ben Franta on Big Oil on Campus</div><div>Bringing you our entire interview with Stanford researcher Ben Franta on fossil fuel influence at universities because it was just too good not to share. Transcript</div><div>
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</div><div>Ep 6: So...What Do We Do about This?</div><div>Over the last five episodes we've tracked how long the fossil fuel industry has been investing in schools, why, and what impact it's had. In this episode, we look at what can be done, and who's trying to do it. Transcript</div><div>
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</div><div>Ep 7: Katie Worth on the State of Climate Education in the U.S.</div><div>Reporter Katie Worth has been researching climate education in the U.S. for years and that research forms the basis of her new book Miseducation. In this interview we delve into what she found. Transcript</div><div>
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</div><div>Background Materials</div><div>We drew on a whole bunch of primary source documents for this season. Several of them are collected here:</div><div>
</div><div>Standard School Broadcast</div><div>This is the oldest educational program in America. It was a weekly educational show created by Standard Oil of California, which later became Chevron. Ostensibly about music appreciation and American history, the Standard School Broadcast first went on air in 1928 and was initially heard in 72 schools via the NBC Pacific Network. Thanks to various syndication deals it was eventually heard in thousands of schools across the western United States. It stayed on air until the late 1970s. We've digitized and transcribed a few examples for you:</div><div>...</div><div>mochans cartoon mickey epcot</div></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
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</div><div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 600;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">March 21, 2002</font></span></p><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The <span class="caps" style="box-sizing: border-box;">API</span> produced a 16-minute video titled <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20150811035415/http://www.classroom-energy.org/oil_natural_gas/fuel_less/index.html" target="blank" rel="noopener external noreferrer" data-wpel-link="external" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; box-shadow: none;">“Fuel-less: you can’t be cool without fuel</a>,” which was distributed through the National Science Teachers Association.</span> The film starts with the line “you’re not going to believe this, but everything everything I have that’s really cool comes from oil!” <a href="https://www.desmog.com/american-petroleum-institute/#s62" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; box-shadow: none;">[62]</a></font></p><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The video was also available on the <span class="caps" style="box-sizing: border-box;">API</span>-owned website Classroom-Energy.org. The website <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20150811035636/http://www.classroom-energy.org/about_us.html" target="blank" rel="noopener external noreferrer" data-wpel-link="external" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; box-shadow: none;">describes its aim as</a> to provide teachers and students with materials on “the vital role of oil and natural gas in modern life.” According to a <span class="caps" style="box-sizing: border-box;">WHOIS</span> lookup, the domain for Classroom Energy was registered by the American Petroleum Institute on March 21, 2002. <a href="https://www.desmog.com/american-petroleum-institute/#s36" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; box-shadow: none;">[36]</a></font></p><blockquote class="wp-block-quote" style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; position: relative; margin-top: 10px;"><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box; padding: 0px 35px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">An <span class="caps" style="box-sizing: border-box;">API</span> memo <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/24/AR2006112400789_pf.html" target="blank" rel="noopener external noreferrer" data-wpel-link="external" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; box-shadow: none;">leaked to the media</a> in 1998 explained <span class="caps" style="box-sizing: border-box;">API</span>‘s plan to target schools:<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);">“Informing teachers/students about uncertainties in climate science will begin to erect barriers against further efforts to impose Kyoto-like measures in the future.”</span> <a href="https://www.desmog.com/american-petroleum-institute/#s37" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; box-shadow: none;">[37]</a></font></p></blockquote><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Classroom-Energy.org now redirects to <a href="http://www.energytomorrow.org/who-we-are" rel="nofollow external noopener noreferrer" data-wpel-link="external" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; box-shadow: none;">energytomorrow.org</a>.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 600; background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Early 1998</font></span></p><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);">As <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1998/04/26/us/industrial-group-plans-to-battle-climate-treaty.html" target="blank" rel="noopener external noreferrer" data-wpel-link="external" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; box-shadow: none;">reported by the New York Times</a>, the American Petroleum Institute developed a communications plan to challenge climate change science. </span>A small group met including representatives from Exxonmobil, Chevron, the Southern Company (a large <span class="caps" style="box-sizing: border-box;">US</span> coal company), the American Petroleum Institute and others from a variety of conservative think tanks including the George C Marshall Institute, Frontiers of Freedom, the Advancement of Sound Science Coalition and the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow — Many of which have received significant funding from the fossil fuel industry. <a href="https://www.desmog.com/american-petroleum-institute/#s38" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; box-shadow: none;">[38]</a>...</font></p><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 600;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">1956</font></span></p><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><span class="caps" style="box-sizing: border-box;">API</span> and the Oil Industry Information Committee sponsored a <a href="https://www.filmpreservation.org/preserved-films/screening-room/destination-earth-1956" data-wpel-link="external" target="blank" rel="external noopener noreferrer" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; box-shadow: none;">cartoon titled “Destination Earth” </a>to promote the petroleum industry</span>. According to the National Film Preservation Foundation, the film is a “Science-fiction-influenced cartoon sponsored by petroleum producers to<b> lionize their industry and promote free enterprise.” </b><a href="https://www.desmog.com/american-petroleum-institute/#s94" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; box-shadow: none;">[94</a></font></p><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">[vid]</font></p><p style="margin-top: 1.5rem; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; box-sizing: border-box;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">in the cartoon, according to the Film Preservation Society description, ”’<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Colonel Cosmic,’ an astronaut from the totalitarian planet Mars, flies to Earth, where he discovers cheap oil and the market economy. Returning home, he leads a revolution and frees Martian entrepreneurs to begin oil exploration, start small businesses, and lead the planet out of economic stagnation.” The cartoon played at New York’s Paramount Theatre before being distributed more widely.</span> <a href="https://www.desmog.com/american-petroleum-institute/#s94" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; box-shadow: none;">[94]</a></font></p></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div></div><div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><a href="https://heated.world/p/when-exxon-used-mickey-mouse-to-promote"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://heated.world/p/when-exxon-used-mickey-mouse-to-promote</font></a></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><h1 style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 1.16em; margin: 1em 0px 0.625em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Another favorite PR strategy of the oil industry: Get ‘em while they’re young</font></h1><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">By Amy Westervelt</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The fossil fuel industry has been weaseling its way into educational materials and public schools for decades.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It’s been happening at least since the 1960s, according to Robert Brulle, an environmental sociologist and professor emeritus at Drexel University, <a href="http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJwlkEtuxCAMhk8z7BLxyHSSBYtueo2IYJOgEkjBdJSevsxEsmX5t_z4bA3hmvKpj1SI1YJ59qDl44NPE2egBxDjfWS-zC4j7sYHTbkiO-oSvDXkU3w3DA_FNj2N0hk3OilAwKLgPhk0E0xuQt4Ey15bZlPBY7So8RfzmSKyoDeio9zU501-NduwnQX9M-UALT2a-0g5QbU-rh1t2LlUig-dqxg6A52JtKWQ1pN5LbnkXPG7UFyooRe9kH9m2IY1i5_bwPdV9qUuhYz97m3aWdaHod1-C9Wq64vxLTfEucW9Rk_njNEsAeGip-tdbxo6D9QRnyUgEeZLbC9RXArBWdsEqc2M-oL6B7U4f38" target="blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJwlkEtuxCAMhk8z7BLxyHSSBYtueo2IYJOgEkjBdJSevsxEsmX5t_z4bA3hmvKpj1SI1YJ59qDl44NPE2egBxDjfWS-zC4j7sYHTbkiO-oSvDXkU3w3DA_FNj2N0hk3OilAwKLgPhk0E0xuQt4Ey15bZlPBY7So8RfzmSKyoDeio9zU501-NduwnQX9M-UALT2a-0g5QbU-rh1t2LlUig-dqxg6A52JtKWQ1pN5LbnkXPG7UFyooRe9kH9m2IY1i5_bwPdV9qUuhYz97m3aWdaHod1-C9Wq64vxLTfEucW9Rk_njNEsAeGip-tdbxo6D9QRnyUgEeZLbC9RXArBWdsEqc2M-oL6B7U4f38&source=gmail&ust=1583612069752000&usg=AFQjCNEezuuXsIF4ppuP6Dfx-3n0yriDCQ">oft-cited in this newsletter</a>.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Pretty much from World War II on, [the American Petroleum Institute] has been actively pushing outreach to schools, and really trying to get their viewpoint about energy and petroleum into schools,” he said. “Certainly they were doing that a lot by the 60s and those efforts continue to this very day.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It wasn’t until the 1970s and 1980s, however, that the effort really started to ramp up. <em>(Note from Emily: You might remember, oil companies <a href="http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJwlkEuOwyAMQE9TdkT80qYLFrOZa0QEnASVTwbIpJnTj9tKCJCNefazpsGSy6m3XBvZK5TROy1uV3a_M-K0cnzoB-LrOBeAaHzQrexAtn0K3prmc3oXqJskq-ZCyB4EH6yb5SB7rpQyQt2v09RbOSvyooxmdx6SBQ2_UM6cgAS9trbVi_y6iG9cx3F01eKj5mekRCi4p87miElTmrcB8AbPZ070keCgZsp7ozb4iANRu5q0ADUhIo8qRk8wpVKzZKwiXgsmGJOs55JxqTrecfFn1KqWwn8uisVFdHWfajP28YKSojfTon1widnlZeEdRgkjnnFPvp0jJDMFcB8_7SP0PW87N9DYZA3QGpRPEKVJJjhnBEku459Jr4DNu3_4Qon9" target="blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJwlkEuOwyAMQE9TdkT80qYLFrOZa0QEnASVTwbIpJnTj9tKCJCNefazpsGSy6m3XBvZK5TROy1uV3a_M-K0cnzoB-LrOBeAaHzQrexAtn0K3prmc3oXqJskq-ZCyB4EH6yb5SB7rpQyQt2v09RbOSvyooxmdx6SBQ2_UM6cgAS9trbVi_y6iG9cx3F01eKj5mekRCi4p87miElTmrcB8AbPZ070keCgZsp7ozb4iANRu5q0ADUhIo8qRk8wpVKzZKwiXgsmGJOs55JxqTrecfFn1KqWwn8uisVFdHWfajP28YKSojfTon1widnlZeEdRgkjnnFPvp0jJDMFcB8_7SP0PW87N9DYZA3QGpRPEKVJJjhnBEku459Jr4DNu3_4Qon9&source=gmail&ust=1583612069752000&usg=AFQjCNF35sUG2xlwRY1hsLJMSQ_60GbXZg">knew about climate change since at least 1977</a>. Is that the reason the effort started to ramp up? Who knows!)</em></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The photos below are from a comic book that Disney put out in conjunction with Exxon in the 1980s, at the same time that Exxon was sponsoring the Universe of Energy Center at Epcot. Both were aimed at shaping kids’ understanding of energy and the economy.</font></p><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 1.6em auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;" /><td align="left" width="550" style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;"><a href="http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxVUstuhSAQ_ZrLDsNLxQWLpkl_w_AYlVwFC9j29uuLumpCmJNhOHOYg9UF5pheao-5oCNDGr1TrO_IMBDklHBUthL5PE4JYNN-VSUdgPbDrN7q4mO4Loieo0UJTi2d6AQOXGus6SZdMbXETtYNhqCzy6gP5yFYUPAF6RUDoFUtpez5wd8e7KMu60KTD5OLts_Gxq2m_KZnqHGCYpezZFz95suDvU-VsMQKPm_A3-YYXS25OVl7srYnb93MYZ9QABIG0hpjpcBGa44F7wEPLZVYO8OZgb4fpGgyb_Smf2PQ3_kWUjnut1_wUpUvaGnfSd1JTIeeYcGExNIJjgdhhoHVEVDbj5SS9od2hDR7mJFXjDBCOGkpJ5SLhjaU_WqxiDnRz4cg28z-zQElteuy2Sfl9XQ-7bjSVdFY43YEX14jBG1WcLdR5Xb2Gnx57aACfOcVSoF0J6t7nLAqDNVOLlbOoBao38L9Aegrr6Y" target="blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxVUstuhSAQ_ZrLDsNLxQWLpkl_w_AYlVwFC9j29uuLumpCmJNhOHOYg9UF5pheao-5oCNDGr1TrO_IMBDklHBUthL5PE4JYNN-VSUdgPbDrN7q4mO4Loieo0UJTi2d6AQOXGus6SZdMbXETtYNhqCzy6gP5yFYUPAF6RUDoFUtpez5wd8e7KMu60KTD5OLts_Gxq2m_KZnqHGCYpezZFz95suDvU-VsMQKPm_A3-YYXS25OVl7srYnb93MYZ9QABIG0hpjpcBGa44F7wEPLZVYO8OZgb4fpGgyb_Smf2PQ3_kWUjnut1_wUpUvaGnfSd1JTIeeYcGExNIJjgdhhoHVEVDbj5SS9od2hDR7mJFXjDBCOGkpJ5SLhjaU_WqxiDnRz4cg28z-zQElteuy2Sfl9XQ-7bjSVdFY43YEX14jBG1WcLdR5Xb2Gnx57aACfOcVSoF0J6t7nLAqDNVOLlbOoBao38L9Aegrr6Y&source=gmail&ust=1583612069752000&usg=AFQjCNFKyA8t4GFA7ExQtbBNIl7XlfwW8A" style="border: none; display: block; height: auto; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; width: auto;"><img alt="" width="550" src="https://ci3.googleusercontent.com/proxy/s02EBr2oWSrpWjsYq16dp9_veS9FwC97vQl9S87J0L4BIvxHUzBTqbnW68KFQbrjAFXm1Du7VD_ko4fQiOCdX3XLYgoEuZ3BnKfqiTPwWC3CniP4DfdCT7IcWuB2CmnTJY-gSL6ofmQX1VgwelsdjqV_L-LzFk2cxdBOPAbxa_p5bYkRE4N3Gg4RmhnfkYNfKGbKsRCNZftMkacnEPzvkdTJDuul4rEIKfr85UAOKbk588AYhWAnxEzztKQWI_nFLoGMII4sOTGEBhtjfWcy0CM0A2WXgrxOz7TtYRgKco2lmE9CcA2TlMqV4ANPic8=s0-d-e1-ft#https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_2210,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc1768a68-1972-4248-8d43-94b992c0c1c7_1105x1600.png" class="CToWUd" style="display: block; height: auto; margin: 0px auto; max-width: 550px; width: 550px; border: none !important;" /></a></td><td style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;" /></tr></tbody></table><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 1.6em auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;" /><td align="left" width="550" style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;"><a href="http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxVUsuO5CAM_JrmRsQrHThwGK20vxHxcBLUCWSAzEzP1y9JTishXCpM2bhwpsKc8lvvqVR0FMhj8JoNT6IUQV4LT2UvUSjjlAE2E1Zd8wFoP-wanKkhxeuCGDhatPFMEUekUxM1gnI3WEqln_qJqyezCp1VRnP4ANGBhi_I7xQBrXqpdS8P_vFgf9tyPnblsKUa9-pc2hoVNjNDixNUt5wp4xq2UB_sz9QEa2rg8wb8Y07Jt5Rbk_Wnan_qts0e7gUVIGMgvbVOCmyN4VjwAbDqqcTGW84sDIOSoiu8M5v5TdF8l7uRpnGYJXV-WCgk6SgJTYiafBgniOVSuBfc-k5QOz3MmRMkJ-6JOQbo8zCpqRRnDSU04oFx3tKPs1YhFzpp8PQbaZ_TcHlPVu6uZelLfT-bTjoltHY4vbEUN9jxCNXcHfRtXb2Wvw9b2DjvBdVqgV8k029zhhlBLUKvnUNKNeoH0L_w92OK5" target="blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxVUsuO5CAM_JrmRsQrHThwGK20vxHxcBLUCWSAzEzP1y9JTishXCpM2bhwpsKc8lvvqVR0FMhj8JoNT6IUQV4LT2UvUSjjlAE2E1Zd8wFoP-wanKkhxeuCGDhatPFMEUekUxM1gnI3WEqln_qJqyezCp1VRnP4ANGBhi_I7xQBrXqpdS8P_vFgf9tyPnblsKUa9-pc2hoVNjNDixNUt5wp4xq2UB_sz9QEa2rg8wb8Y07Jt5Rbk_Wnan_qts0e7gUVIGMgvbVOCmyN4VjwAbDqqcTGW84sDIOSoiu8M5v5TdF8l7uRpnGYJXV-WCgk6SgJTYiafBgniOVSuBfc-k5QOz3MmRMkJ-6JOQbo8zCpqRRnDSU04oFx3tKPs1YhFzpp8PQbaZ_TcHlPVu6uZelLfT-bTjoltHY4vbEUN9jxCNXcHfRtXb2Wvw9b2DjvBdVqgV8k029zhhlBLUKvnUNKNeoH0L_w92OK5&source=gmail&ust=1583612069753000&usg=AFQjCNFROHmJp22QRznBkYJONCy6hNziCg" style="border: none; display: block; height: auto; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; width: auto;">[grf]</a></td><td style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;" /></tr></tbody></table><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">This one has an energy conservation theme—and also makes the point that solar and wind are, you know, <em>meh</em>. </font></p><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 1.6em auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;" /><td align="left" width="550" style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;"><a href="http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxVUstuhSAQ_ZrLTsNLxAWLpkl_w_AYlVwFC9j29uuLumpCmJPDcGaYg9UF5pheao-5oCNDGr1TtBd4GDByijsiO4l8HqcEsGm_qpIOQPthVm918TFcF3jP0KIEM1ZTKmjvnBYSnOs7MJgAnQY5cYHOKqM-nIdgQcEXpFcMgFa1lLLnB3t70I-6rAttPkwu2j5bG7dK-U3PUOMExS5nyrj6zZcHfZ-qYIkVfN6Avc0xuppya9LuVO1O3bqZwz6hAKQGcGeMlbwxWrOGsx6aoSOy0c4waqDvB8nbzFq96d8Y9He-G6ka99sveHWVL8gEtXyyppGdrXqUQyMZtY0YRKf5MAxS8JFQjH-IwLjdw4y8orgSDHeEYcJ4S1pCfzVf-JzI54Pjbab_5oCS2nXZ7JOwejqfdlx07WiscTuCL68RgjYruNuocjt7Db68dlABvvMKpUC6yeoew5QQjGolF6tmUAvUb-H-APqNrp8" target="blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxVUstuhSAQ_ZrLTsNLxAWLpkl_w_AYlVwFC9j29uuLumpCmJPDcGaYg9UF5pheao-5oCNDGr1TtBd4GDByijsiO4l8HqcEsGm_qpIOQPthVm918TFcF3jP0KIEM1ZTKmjvnBYSnOs7MJgAnQY5cYHOKqM-nIdgQcEXpFcMgFa1lLLnB3t70I-6rAttPkwu2j5bG7dK-U3PUOMExS5nyrj6zZcHfZ-qYIkVfN6Avc0xuppya9LuVO1O3bqZwz6hAKQGcGeMlbwxWrOGsx6aoSOy0c4waqDvB8nbzFq96d8Y9He-G6ka99sveHWVL8gEtXyyppGdrXqUQyMZtY0YRKf5MAxS8JFQjH-IwLjdw4y8orgSDHeEYcJ4S1pCfzVf-JzI54Pjbab_5oCS2nXZ7JOwejqfdlx07WiscTuCL68RgjYruNuocjt7Db68dlABvvMKpUC6yeoew5QQjGolF6tmUAvUb-H-APqNrp8&source=gmail&ust=1583612069753000&usg=AFQjCNGSdNw1EaO4XgSZS2g-3c4Jn3VvLg" style="border: none; display: block; height: auto; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; width: auto;"><img alt="" width="550" src="https://ci5.googleusercontent.com/proxy/XPAhCpSiPsG4tyK9GLmwOlSrBwn8z3s-Iim53tkIbak6h_Xk6m19kIcWHAhGRVBZpriakVpG8CrUDQhbP5K2XQIkUWhBwzzElU9yw9wzBGh5_4AZWi8TYdABvaGv-ZJk6FFDmtvEQbQAdOFOQBUyZnnL1h0lTcNesvW24dk0NXU_6SoDEnYRr1iwUnIiW4MLWD79EPS9sR_0v1ARg6tKkoJfeGsi4ZAMwAAUfGDZGZWe8PhOf6fFiWGNvuyulov6exNvxkvstrafgiBpDWPPxfA7GTtpT8NqOmqwkB89NZ6qbW-w48iY3NRPQJRf44=s0-d-e1-ft#https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_2400,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F362c4fcb-85c3-424e-832c-6965a4999864_1200x1600.png" class="CToWUd" style="display: block; height: auto; margin: 0px auto; max-width: 550px; width: 550px; border: none !important;" /></a></td><td style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;" /></tr></tbody></table><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Exxon’s Universe of Energy Center was at Epcot from 1982 through 1996. That’s fascinating, because that’s <em>the exact time span</em> that Exxon went from researching climate change to explicitly denying it. (Exxon’s denial started in the late 80s and picked up steam throughout the 90s).</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">And this exhibit touting fossil fuels—which again, was to KIDS AT DISNEYWORLD—opened in the same year that Exxon’s manager of environmental affairs, M.B. Glaser, <a href="http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJwlkMuOgzAMRb-m2QXlAYUuspjN_AbKw0DUPJhghjJfPymVLEW-lnN9j9UIcy6nWvOGZN-gjN4p0d_Z48GIU63jQzcQv41TAYjaB4VlB7LuJnir0ed0LbS9JIsy8jHwrrv3TghmtQTTOS2MmKa-b91gyNtl1LvzkCwo-IVy5gQkqAVxvcmvm_iudRxHY4OP9bbJB9gam2OV4fXKKWbjQ234YxA0QswUM70mNOqkZ4iQkGqTd6Q2CzrXs9OSazIK0wQW6y7xSjDBmGQdl4zLtuENF3-6Xdq58J9by-Ismm03G2r7fLuTolaN0T65rNP5zeGSK4axvnFPHs8RkjYB3IcQfpBeifFcQSU4tgCIUD5ixSaZ4JyR6uRy_TOpBWpm9w-Rbosi" target="blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJwlkMuOgzAMRb-m2QXlAYUuspjN_AbKw0DUPJhghjJfPymVLEW-lnN9j9UIcy6nWvOGZN-gjN4p0d_Z48GIU63jQzcQv41TAYjaB4VlB7LuJnir0ed0LbS9JIsy8jHwrrv3TghmtQTTOS2MmKa-b91gyNtl1LvzkCwo-IVy5gQkqAVxvcmvm_iudRxHY4OP9bbJB9gam2OV4fXKKWbjQ234YxA0QswUM70mNOqkZ4iQkGqTd6Q2CzrXs9OSazIK0wQW6y7xSjDBmGQdl4zLtuENF3-6Xdq58J9by-Ismm03G2r7fLuTolaN0T65rNP5zeGSK4axvnFPHs8RkjYB3IcQfpBeifFcQSU4tgCIUD5ixSaZ4JyR6uRy_TOpBWpm9w-Rbosi&source=gmail&ust=1583612069753000&usg=AFQjCNGKI8xfvWanMygQMK9cAiqUAhv5Bw">sent a memo</a> out to company executives about the greenhouse effect. This memo noted that fossil fuel combustion, along with clearing of virgin forests, were the primary contributions to the warming trend.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The memo added: “Our best estimate is that doubling of the current concentration could increase average global temperature by about 1.3 degrees celsius to 3.1 degrees celsius.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Despite that knowledge, the comics and Epcot center explicitly promote fossil fuels as a method of environmental conservation, noted Carroll Muffet, the president and CEO of the Center for International Environmental Law.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“[Exxon] put out these in conjunction with Disney to teach kids about renewable energy and energy conservation and environmental concerns,” she said. “And it's perhaps unsurprising that what children learn from Mickey and Goofy about energy conservation and environmental concerns was we really need gas, we really need fracking, we win. Nuclear energy is fine. There are a lot of problems with wind and solar. It may work out eventually, but thank goodness for this bountiful resource of oil, gas and tar sands.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Exxon wasn’t the only one using comic books to reach the youths. In the 1970s, Amoco put out a wildly racist comic book about “The Mochans,” a “primitive” people who wanted to do unseemly things like use renewable energy. The comic was released as part of a study guide for 7th to 12th graders studying economics—which Amoco graciously provided 40,000 copies of to Indiana public schools. </font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“The industry was teaching kids to be skeptical of regulation, skeptical of the agendas of environmentalists or people who were socially concerned, from their very earliest ages,” Muffett said, “and [they were] constantly emphasizing that anyone who talks about the environment, who talks about human health, should immediately be weighing that and defending it against the economic costs.” </font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Sound familiar? It should. These are the same refrains the industry uses today in its various attempts to shape the minds of young people, both in schools and in the media. And it’s reflected in the way most political pundits seem to think about what’s possible for climate action. You want to preserve a livable world? Well, how much will it cost?</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Here’s one more example of the oil industry getting into teaching economics: Phillips’ Petroleum’s <em>American Enterprise </em>educational film series—hosted by none other than William Shatner. (I got my hands on the VHS but it hasn’t arrived yet—it’s taking forever!)</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The subtitle is: How Did this America, in its 200 Years on Independence, Become a Nation of Supermarkets, Stock Markets, Skyscrapers and Split Levels; A Country With the Greatest Economic Output in the World? </font></p><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 1.6em auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;" /><td align="left" width="550" style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;"><a href="http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxVUtuOrSAM_ZrNmwYoCj7wMDnJ-Q3DpbrJVnAEZ2bP1x_Up5OQdqW0q6ULZwrOaX_rLeVCjoz7GLzmsqfDQInXwjPVKRLyOO2IqwmLLvuBZDvsEpwpIcWrQEggz1pnBZeqnyhI510Hg4OJUq9Uj8CZJ2eX0Rw-YHSo8Qv3d4pIFv0sZcsP-Hjwv_U4H9t82FyMe7UurTUUVjNj9RMW9zxTxiWsoTz4n6kSllTB5w3gY07J15Sbk3cna3fyVmMP98KCuDdIO2udEo01BhoBEpuhY6ox3gK3KOWgRJuhNav5TdF853uQynGYLXVPmCw4SGDmpoUEna1L31jTJCNh566tzUgbRm7IH-QMfbLc4kaE45pUA7BpSBaFnL-K8RTzHv7PMh6Drz_7ZAdr2ZsroXg3o7n2Jc4TrPWP16xFDeI0ZjF_S3TOXW9Vp7eW-oI37nBUvB_Q5W7YByxiipnXyqnFE_sX4K_w8B6q48" target="blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxVUtuOrSAM_ZrNmwYoCj7wMDnJ-Q3DpbrJVnAEZ2bP1x_Up5OQdqW0q6ULZwrOaX_rLeVCjoz7GLzmsqfDQInXwjPVKRLyOO2IqwmLLvuBZDvsEpwpIcWrQEggz1pnBZeqnyhI510Hg4OJUq9Uj8CZJ2eX0Rw-YHSo8Qv3d4pIFv0sZcsP-Hjwv_U4H9t82FyMe7UurTUUVjNj9RMW9zxTxiWsoTz4n6kSllTB5w3gY07J15Sbk3cna3fyVmMP98KCuDdIO2udEo01BhoBEpuhY6ox3gK3KOWgRJuhNav5TdF853uQynGYLXVPmCw4SGDmpoUEna1L31jTJCNh566tzUgbRm7IH-QMfbLc4kaE45pUA7BpSBaFnL-K8RTzHv7PMh6Drz_7ZAdr2ZsroXg3o7n2Jc4TrPWP16xFDeI0ZjF_S3TOXW9Vp7eW-oI37nBUvB_Q5W7YByxiipnXyqnFE_sX4K_w8B6q48&source=gmail&ust=1583612069753000&usg=AFQjCNFR7cq917hAdOs7w61hNFojPyY66A" style="border: none; display: block; height: auto; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; width: auto;"><img alt="" width="550" src="https://ci3.googleusercontent.com/proxy/thfub8BF2XF0P5jGyynnYyMHbho5EJIj-OVMDu34t9r7yI_foyZoj1CAQiBs48pi1FIhIR-nQqy3p0UUzLe9m_TZy9abkG2Kg51Hiaru5Cj-zw16TR4ZfCQJDqW6uuC3zR8A-Nwk1Nf7hITWGUcyKoAU9cw-Np9e8W0c3N_c31AfXq9h5iAuK55-5iYJ-jwphIgnJWrX_sE_lAybiBdOcWyhhB2PKhdGiV0or49KInBPnTCl3tE8dAxNDmu7rKuzilcvtqzWehA_6Zp9deB3dWnNL4rwNaS2bDjtIj5_4NBFflpkkp9qZUxkxs39=s0-d-e1-ft#https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1260,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F9fea0989-e870-4d16-8a47-d360ccf537ba_630x352.png" class="CToWUd" style="display: block; height: auto; margin: 0px auto; max-width: 550px; width: 550px; border: none !important;" /></a></td><td style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;" /></tr></tbody></table><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">I found out about this film series after Muffett pointed me to the Center for the Study of Responsive Law’s report <em>Hucksters in the Classroom</em>. That report notes that Phillips took a hands-off approach with the film series in order to make sure it would be acceptable in classrooms.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Instead of developing it themselves, the marketing company that produced it for them contacted economists and historians who helped them put together a five-part series that enthusiastically affirms capitalism. And the series was an unmitigated success. It was picked up by 10 different state education TV programs, and more than 50 percent of the country’s secondary schools had booked the series by 1978, two years after its 1976 release. By the end of 1978 it had been seen by more than 5 million American high school students. </font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><em>The New York Times </em><a href="http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJwlkU2OhCAQhU_T7NoUP63tgsVs5hoGpVQygg5VtnFOP9idkFfkEeoVH4NjnNZ82m0lFjth7oK3qqmhbUF4a7x8Pp4iUDdmxOjCYjnvKLa9X8LgOKzpfcE0WswW6xYA2_6JYz1CY0zrtdeuh6ItPHpxpXRu9wHTgBZfmM81oVjszLzRTX_d1HdZx3FU6eQQkaphjcWRbVOXAqaIgiIuD3N4IV1bX_pwoJCm-xiWSHfijET3a-Q7Jsa85UBYzRwXEawCBaDhITVIbSpZSfXnzGymLH9vBuKkKtp7Yjf8XOki281xHH6kLqfTxeBtFwRdqXFPgc8Ok-sX9B86_MH5fi2fG9qEBy3IZZKPWZBpUFKCKEl-LT2TnbH8hf8H9fGIZQ" target="blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJwlkU2OhCAQhU_T7NoUP63tgsVs5hoGpVQygg5VtnFOP9idkFfkEeoVH4NjnNZ82m0lFjth7oK3qqmhbUF4a7x8Pp4iUDdmxOjCYjnvKLa9X8LgOKzpfcE0WswW6xYA2_6JYz1CY0zrtdeuh6ItPHpxpXRu9wHTgBZfmM81oVjszLzRTX_d1HdZx3FU6eQQkaphjcWRbVOXAqaIgiIuD3N4IV1bX_pwoJCm-xiWSHfijET3a-Q7Jsa85UBYzRwXEawCBaDhITVIbSpZSfXnzGymLH9vBuKkKtp7Yjf8XOki281xHH6kLqfTxeBtFwRdqXFPgc8Ok-sX9B86_MH5fi2fG9qEBy3IZZKPWZBpUFKCKEl-LT2TnbH8hf8H9fGIZQ&source=gmail&ust=1583612069753000&usg=AFQjCNGdduvjjpSv-Hf1pF97fo7PTRZjPQ">ran a story</a> on the series in 1976 as it was being released, calling it, “the latest contribution to the ongoing business effort to interest the American people in the free‐enterprise system.” </font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">No these are such common ideas. They’ve been drilled into our heads since we were very young, by the same people making billions drilling oil from the ground.</font></p></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">=</font></div></div><div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><a href="https://heated.world/p/the-fossil-fuel-industrys-public">https://heated.world/p/the-fossil-fuel-industrys-public</a></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;">
</div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Hello, and welcome to Day 2 of HEATED’s week-long series on climate education in public schools.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">We kicked off Day 1 by <a href="https://heated.world/p/public-schools-lack-climate-education" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">shining a light on the positive impacts of comprehensive climate education</a>. We cited research showing that classrooms can be essential breeding grounds for climate-conscious citizens. Not only do climate-educated students have lower individual carbon footprints; their behavior pressures others to behave more sustainably, too. This is important, because <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/02/20/how-peer-pressure-can-help-save-planet/?arc404=true" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">the planet’s livability depends on peer pressure</a> to build public enthusiasm for decarbonization.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">But as a whole, American classrooms are not currently creating climate-conscious citizens. Indeed, many are doing the exact opposite.</p><h3 style="font-family: " sf="SF" compact="Compact" display="Display" apple-system="apple-system" blinkmacsystemfont="BlinkMacSystemFont" segoe="Segoe" ui="UI" roboto="Roboto" helvetica="Helvetica" arial="Arial" sans-serif="sans-serif" apple="Apple" color="color" emoji="Emoji" symbol="Symbol" margin="margin" em="em" px="px" rgb="rgb" line-height="line-height" font-size="font-size">Students are taught about climate. Just not very well.</h3><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">There are approximately 13,500 school districts in America, containing more than <a href="https://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/ed/17/08/when-it-comes-education-federal-government-charge-um-what" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">100,000 public schools</a>. The federal government does not require any of these schools to teach climate change.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Every state has different standards for what kids should learn about—and each school district is <a href="https://www.outsideonline.com/2407922/climate-change-education-america" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">individually responsible</a> for implementing those standards. That means that how climate is taught—if climate is taught—<a href="https://www.outsideonline.com/2407922/climate-change-education-america" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">varies widely from district to district</a>, and often even classroom to classroom.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Most kids do appear to be learning about climate change. According to <a href="https://ncse.ngo/files/MixedMessagesReport.pdf" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">a 2016 survey by the National Center for Science Education</a>, 70 percent of middle school teachers and 87 percent of high school teachers spend at least an hour on global warming each year. Only about 3 to 4 percent of students receive no teaching of human-caused climate change.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Still, even though kids in America are learning about climate change, their lessons are limited and often contain misinformation, according to the NCSE survey. Newsweek <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/science-teachers-confused-climate-change-425650" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">summarized some the more concerning results</a>:</p><blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid rgb(239, 98, 48); margin: 1em 0px; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;"><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em 1em;">Although most students will hear something about climate change in a science class, the average teacher devotes only one to two hours to the topic per year. Nearly one-third of teachers emphasize that recent global warming is likely due to natural causes—and tell their students that many scientists say the same thing. The researchers speculate that some teachers may wish to teach "both sides" out of respect for the individual values and opinions their students bring to the classroom.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em 1em;">Half of the surveyed teachers have allowed the students to discuss the supposed "controversy" over climate change without guiding students to the scientifically supported conclusion. <strong>Three of five surveyed teachers admit to being unaware of, or actively misinformed about, the near total consensus among scientists that climate change is man-made.</strong></p></blockquote><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">That last sentence is bolded because it’s especially critical to understanding why most public school students don’t receive a comprehensive climate education. Teachers, notoriously overworked and underpaid, are often individually responsible for deciding whether and how climate change gets taught. They don’t have the resources to educate themselves on the nuances of the climate crisis, much less develop lesson plans around it.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">The fossil fuel industry, however, has plenty of resources. And it’s using those resources to provide teachers across the country with pro-fossil fuel lesson plans.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">“The school systems of the country are so fragmented and under-resourced that they have no choice but to turn to people like the oil industry who offer them free stuff,” Charles Anderson, a professor of science education at Michigan State University, <a href="https://apnews.com/d6d431f046c9494d8bf5bab5a07bfb55" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">told the Associated Press</a> last year.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">These lesson plans aren’t focused on educating kids on the dangers of human-caused climate change, or the importance of stopping it. They’re focused on promoting the false idea that fossil fuels are essential to human prosperity—and that taking them away will cause everything students love to die.</p><h3 style="font-family: " sf="SF" compact="Compact" display="Display" apple-system="apple-system" blinkmacsystemfont="BlinkMacSystemFont" segoe="Segoe" ui="UI" roboto="Roboto" helvetica="Helvetica" arial="Arial" sans-serif="sans-serif" apple="Apple" color="color" emoji="Emoji" symbol="Symbol" margin="margin" em="em" px="px" rgb="rgb" line-height="line-height" font-size="font-size">In Oklahoma, students are told "Having no petroleum is like a nightmare!"</h3><a class="image-link" target="blank" href="https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd2bb57f9-ffd6-4a7c-9d39-0e059bb7c909_1126x982.png" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26); text-decoration-line: none; display: block; padding: 0px; margin: 1.6em auto; width: auto; height: auto; border: none; font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">[grfx]</a><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Before her retirement in 2016, Tara Barker was a public school science teacher in Oklahoma for 33 years. Throughout her tenure, <a href="https://oerbhomeroom.com/ebooks/" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">she taught her kids about fossil fuels using Petro Pete</a>—a little boy who looks like an old man dressed as an oil worker.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Petro Pete is part of an education series on fossil fuels proliferated by the <a href="http://www.oerb.com/" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">Oklahoma Energy Resources Board</a>, a state agency funded by oil and gas producers. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jun/15/big-oil-classrooms-pipeline-oklahoma-education" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">According to The Guardian</a>, the OERB “has spent upwards of $40 million over the past two decades on providing education with a pro-industry bent, including hundreds of pages of curriculums, a speaker series and an after-school program—all at no cost to educators of children from kindergarten to high school.”</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Barker said the industry’s lesson plans and workshops were helpful to her. “I loved getting the materials,” she said. But the outcome of the lessons always left her feeling like something was missing. “I just felt like they didn’t finish the story,” she said. “They didn’t tell the whole thing.”</p><a class="image-link" target="blank" href="https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F051b83a6-8975-4e07-b4f4-b0cece53eb24_2560x1600.jpeg" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26); text-decoration-line: none; display: block; padding: 0px; margin: 1.6em auto; width: auto; height: auto; border: none; font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;"><img src="src" data-attrs="{" https="https" bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com="bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com" public="public" images="images" b83a6-8975-4e07-b4f4-b0cece53eb24_2560x1600.jpeg="b83a6-8975-4e07-b4f4-b0cece53eb24_2560x1600.jpeg" height="height" width="width" bytes="bytes" alt="" null="null" title="title" type="type" image="image" jpeg="jpeg" href="href" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto; width: 728px; height: auto; max-width: 1456px; max-height: 910px;" /></a><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">The missing things, it turns out, were climate change and renewable energy. Neither is mentioned in “<a href="https://oerbhomeroom.com/ebooks/" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">Petro Pete’s Big Bad Dream</a>.”</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">In this widely taught story, Pete drifts off to sleep and wakes up unable to find anything he normally depends on. He has no clothes; no toothbrush; no comb. His schoolbus never comes, so he walks to school, and when he gets there the clock has a sad face on it. During lunch, Pete wants strawberry ice cream, but there is none. Later, he goes out to play soccer, but there are no soccer balls. “Pete is disappointed,” it says.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Eventually, Pete’s science teacher—the appropriately named Ms. Rigwell—explains that all the things Pete was missing were either made by oil or made possible by oil. “Having no petroleum is like a nightmare,” Pete concludes. </p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Barker said saw Petro Pete have an impact on students. “It makes the kids feel like, ‘Oh wow, we really need this,’” she said. “It scares them that we’re going to run out.” She said she wanted to make sure she was teaching about the possibilities of renewable energy, too—but the oil industry didn’t provide free material on that. She had to develop that curriculum herself, on her own time.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Today, that alternative curriculum is called the <a href="http://www.okrenewables.org/news/2018/04/oreep-teacher-workshop" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">Oklahoma Renewable Energy Education Program</a>. “We call it the other side of the story; the compliment to it,” Barker said. Barker’s group is trying to hold workshops for teachers across the state just like the oil and gas industry does, and have the curriculum accepted in all of Oklahoma’s school districts. But she’s struggling with funding. “We don’t have a grant right now, so we’re using leftover materials and we’re working on what we have.”</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">The oil and gas industry, of course, does not have this problem. And its bid to influence public education extends far beyond Oklahoma.</p><h3 style="font-family: " sf="SF" compact="Compact" display="Display" apple-system="apple-system" blinkmacsystemfont="BlinkMacSystemFont" segoe="Segoe" ui="UI" roboto="Roboto" helvetica="Helvetica" arial="Arial" sans-serif="sans-serif" apple="Apple" color="color" emoji="Emoji" symbol="Symbol" margin="margin" em="em" px="px" rgb="rgb" line-height="line-height" font-size="font-size">Creating pro-fossil fuel kids across the country</h3><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">There are many more state-specific examples of fossil fuel industry and interest groups funding educational material. <a href="https://educationprojects.org/stories/oogeep" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">The Ohio Oil and Gas Energy Educational Program</a>, for example, is an industry-funded effort to provide workshops and educational material for Ohio teachers. These materials include <a href="https://www.oogeep.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Environmental-Benefits.pdf" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">a worksheet on the environmental benefits of crude oil and gas</a>, a crude oil <a href="https://www.oogeep.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Crude-Oil-Word-Find.pdf" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">word find</a>, and <a href="https://www.oogeep.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Kids-Activity-Placemat-August-2018.pdf" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">an activity placemat for kids</a>.</p><a class="image-link" target="blank" href="https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4c4d7d5d-7b21-42f7-89bd-08c8e52beb29_1008x1142.png" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26); text-decoration-line: none; display: block; padding: 0px; margin: 1.6em auto; width: auto; height: auto; border: none; font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">[grf]</a><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;" /><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Culver Company, a consulting firm for energy and natural gas utilities, provides educational material for schools, including a workbook from kids Grade 3-6. In <em>Natural Gas: Your Invisible Friend</em>, “youngsters explore where gas comes from, how it’s used, and why it’s important to be careful around natural gas,” <a href="http://culverco.com/product/natural-gas-your-invisible-friend" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">the description says</a>.</p><a class="image-link" target="blank" href="https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F27ccdf14-db58-4336-891b-87bcc1d1d94b_196x257.jpeg" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26); text-decoration-line: none; display: block; padding: 0px; margin: 1.6em auto; width: auto; height: auto; border: none; font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;"><img src="src" data-attrs="{" https="https" bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com="bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com" public="public" images="images" ccdf14-db58-4336-891b-87bcc1d1d94b_196x257.jpeg="ccdf14-db58-4336-891b-87bcc1d1d94b_196x257.jpeg" height="height" width="width" bytes="bytes" alt="" null="null" title="title" type="type" image="image" jpeg="jpeg" href="href" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto; width: 196px; height: auto; max-width: 196px; max-height: 257px;" /></a><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Then there’s the National Energy Education Development Project, or NEED Project, which is sponsored by <a href="https://www.need.org/partners/sponsors-partners/" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">more than 100 corporate partners</a>, including nearly every major U.S.-based oil and gas company and oil industry interest group. The NEED Project “publishes thousands of pages of K-12 energy lessons online,” <a href="https://hechingerreport.org/oils-pipeline-to-americas-schools/" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">according to the non-profit education news publication the Hechinger Report</a>. Those lessons include one where students learn “how to frack a frozen layer cake using chocolate syrup and a syringe-like turkey injector.” Another guide tells the story of Sue Ann, “a sticky pool of oil waiting to be freed.”</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">
[grfx]</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">If industry groups were only creating energy-specific lesson plans that upsell the benefits of their product to the next generation, perhaps that could be justified. But that is not the extent of their activity.These educational materials are not all misleading in their own right. Many actually contain scientifically robust information about how fossil fuel extraction and power generation work. But when these materials aren’t paired with robust climate change education, they paint a false picture in students’ minds about the benefits of fossil fuel use.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Indeed, the oil industry is also creating and promoting a climate science curriculum for public school children which downplays the crisis their products are directly worsening every day.</p><h3 style="font-family: " sf="SF" compact="Compact" display="Display" apple-system="apple-system" blinkmacsystemfont="BlinkMacSystemFont" segoe="Segoe" ui="UI" roboto="Roboto" helvetica="Helvetica" arial="Arial" sans-serif="sans-serif" apple="Apple" color="color" emoji="Emoji" symbol="Symbol" margin="margin" em="em" px="px" rgb="rgb" line-height="line-height" font-size="font-size">A nationwide climate science curriculum, sponsored by Big Oil</h3><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Climate denial groups have long tried to push their agenda on the public school system. For example, as Outside Magazine <a href="https://www.outsideonline.com/2407922/climate-change-education-america" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">notes</a>, “In 2017, the Heartland Institute, a <a href="http://desmogblog.com/heartland-institute" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">conservative think tank</a> funded in part by fossil-fuel interests, sent every science teacher in the United States a misleading book called <em>Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming</em>.”</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">This type of outright denial, however, wouldn’t be allowed to be taught in at least 36 states. That’s because <a href="https://www.climate.gov/teaching/national-climate-assessment-and-next-generation-science-standards" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">those states have adopted the Next Generation Science Standards</a>, which require schools to “introduce global climate change as a core idea in middle school,” and include in that core idea that “human activities affect global warming.”</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">But the NGSS is not a deterrent for oil companies. Indeed, through the NEED Project, oil companies like BP, Shell, and ConocoPhillips are funding the creation of industry-friendly climate lesson plans.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">These lessons include accurate information about climate change, in that they admit the phenomenon is human-caused and that there are detrimental impacts. But they’re also heavily laden with industry-friendly talking points, including that fossil fuels are necessary for human prosperity; that “the climate has always changed;” and that humans will simply adapt to the outcome.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Take a look, for example, at the NEED Project’s “Introduction to Climate Change.” It begins by saying that the climate “has been in a constant state of change.” It cites the earth’s orbit and the sun before mentioning greenhouse gases. It says “natural and manmade” forces govern the climate. These are classic red herring rhetorical devices commonly used by Republican politicians to downplay and question human-caused climate change.</p><a class="image-link" target="blank" href="https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa457bde8-54ea-44d3-a004-02ae0978b596_596x688.png" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26); text-decoration-line: none; display: block; padding: 0px; margin: 1.6em auto; width: auto; height: auto; border: none; font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;"><img src="src" data-attrs="{" https="https" bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com="bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com" public="public" images="images" a457bde8-54ea-44d3-a004-02ae0978b596_596x688.png="a457bde8-54ea-44d3-a004-02ae0978b596_596x688.png" height="height" width="width" bytes="bytes" alt="" null="null" title="title" type="type" image="image" png="png" href="href" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto; width: 596px; height: auto; max-width: 596px; max-height: 688px;" /></a><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Take a look, also, at the NEED Project’s section on the “effects of climate change.” It begins, not by talking about ocean acidification or extreme weather, but by extolling the benefits of fossil fuels. It then says scientists “are studying” the effects and what they “may be,” implying falsely that scientists aren’t already confident about it.</p><a class="image-link" target="blank" href="https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae4fcf24-c4da-4bee-bca8-ed51ae7ad469_552x352.png" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26); text-decoration-line: none; display: block; padding: 0px; margin: 1.6em auto; width: auto; height: auto; border: none; font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;"><img src="src" data-attrs="{" https="https" bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com="bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com" public="public" images="images" ae4fcf24-c4da-4bee-bca8-ed51ae7ad469_552x352.png="ae4fcf24-c4da-4bee-bca8-ed51ae7ad469_552x352.png" height="height" width="width" bytes="bytes" alt="" null="null" title="title" type="type" image="image" png="png" href="href" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto; width: 552px; height: auto; max-width: 552px; max-height: 352px;" /></a><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">The NEED Project’s section on solving climate change is perhaps most alarming. It insists that “societies around the world have adapted to changes in their environment,” giving false hope to students that society will simply adapt to the effects of the climate crisis.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">It also says “Many scientists believe that climate change can be mitigated through advances in technology and individual lifestyle modifications,” which is untrue. The vast majority of climate scientists believe climate change can only be mitigated by ramping down the extraction and burning of fossil fuels.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Of course, this is not mentioned.</p><a class="image-link" target="blank" href="https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F10c09bd2-b8e4-4558-a421-794d454f75bf_532x532.png" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26); text-decoration-line: none; display: block; padding: 0px; margin: 1.6em auto; width: auto; height: auto; border: none; font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;"><img src="src" data-attrs="{" https="https" bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com="bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com" public="public" images="images" c09bd2-b8e4-4558-a421-794d454f75bf_532x532.png="c09bd2-b8e4-4558-a421-794d454f75bf_532x532.png" height="height" width="width" bytes="bytes" alt="" null="null" title="title" type="type" image="image" png="png" href="href" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto; width: 532px; height: auto; max-width: 532px; max-height: 532px;" /></a><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Still, material like this may be better than most currently available. According to the Associated Press, <a href="https://apnews.com/d6d431f046c9494d8bf5bab5a07bfb55" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">less than 3 percent of all publicly available climate educational resources for teachers contain 100 percent up-to-date, factual information about climate change</a>.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">“There’s a lot of information that’s out there that is broken, old, misleading, not scientifically sound, not sound technically,” Frank Niepold, a climate education coordinator at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told the AP.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">And it’s been like this for literally decades.</p><p style="line-height: 1.6em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; color: rgb(26, 26, 26); font-family: Spectral, serif; font-size: 19px;">Is it any wonder the current generation doesn’t have the political will to address the climate crisis?</p></div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></div></div><div></div><div>end</div><div>"You may be able to note that it is boiling violently, just as water would boil on a stove," he says, holding up a glass of the clear liquid. "Yes, it's a safe refrigerant. I'll just pour some on my clothing. And now, watch the frost appear. I'll blow on it. Oh, it's cold all right."</div><div>
</div><div>Scientists now know Freon is far from benign. Forms of the coolant are still being phased out after research in the 1980s found it was rapidly depleting the Earth's ozone layer. The volatile chemical is moderately toxic when inhaled.</div><div>
</div><div>Shot in the 1960s, The Magic Barrel promoted a one-man show of the same name developed by chemical giant DuPont for the American Petroleum Institute. By 1954, DuPont had trained 600 oil-industry workers to deliver the show-and-tell in classrooms, with 40 assigned to New York's 230 middle schools and high schools. The lecture was a fixture of Oil Progress Week, API's bygone annual celebration of all things petroleum.</div><div>
</div><div>Half a century later, a version of the demonstration—which uses a suitcase instead of a barrel and originally targeted women's groups—lives on. YouTube videos show the talk being delivered at elementary schools in West Virginia, a state embracing natural gas amid coal's decline.The Magic Suitcase also has made the rounds in Texas, Wyoming, Louisiana, and most recently in Pennsylvania and Colorado.</div><div>
</div><div>While oil and gas is not the only industry to market to young audiences, it is among the most prolific and enduring. Records detail API's early efforts to rehab the industry's image by influencing educators. In the 1950s, companies like DuPont worked hand in hand with API's budding public-relations division, which sent "flying squadrons" of industry representatives to schools nationwide, getting two million copies of API lessons into classrooms.</div><div>
</div><div>Inspiration for these squadrons sprang from a 1946 study surveying 10,000 Americans, according to the 1990 API history. The document's author wrote that, "the more people knew about the petroleum industry, the more favorable were their feelings towards it." To combat the industry's negative reputation, the study suggested "a well-directed program of public education was the right medicine to bring about a cure."</div><div>
</div><div>Hill & Knowlton—the public-relations firm that would later help the tobacco industry fend off cancer claims—was brought on to strategize. The firm surmised that the "petroleum industry's legislative difficulties could be traced to misunderstandings by government and the public" and laid out a plan to cultivate '"thought leaders' or 'opinion molders'—educators, editors, columnists, the clergy, business and financial leaders and, of course, key people in government," according to the 1990 document.</div><div>
</div><div>In 1960, educators helped revamp API materials that eventually made their way into 25,000 secondary schools. Advertisers were hired to ghost-write scripts hyping oil for popular children's programs like Art Linkletter's "House Party." The widely televised Odyssey: A Quest for Energy was among dozens of educational videos made available through API's vast regional network.</div><div>
</div><div>The 1982 film examined renewable energy, but made the best case for fossil fuels—urging that offshore drilling be expanded "into deeper waters" and that federal lands be opened for coal mining in promotional brochures sent to some 14,000 schools. Within months, more than 1,300 schools wanted to screen Odyssey. Indiana officials ordered enough kits to show the film to every high-schooler in the state. API's public relations team meticulously tracked "Odyssey's" reach, estimating that at least five million Americans saw the film.</div><div>
</div><div>API did not respond to requests for comment.</div><div>
</div><div>API's message was amplified with the help of an unlikely ally—the National Science Teachers Association, which boasts some 55,000 members of mostly K-12 educators. The association worked closely with API and utility executives during the 1970s to develop K-12 energy curricula. When federal funding dried up in the 1980s, the association turned to corporate sponsors to cover costs.</div><div>
</div><div>As pressure to act on global warming mounted during the 1990s, API ramped up its strategy to quiet critics, including leveraging its relationship with the teachers association. Months after the language of a global climate treaty known as the Kyoto Protocol was finalized in 1997, an internal memo obtained by The New York Times laid out API's plans to infuse doubt about climate change into K-12 materials. Less than a decade later, the association garnered criticism for distributing API's "Fuel-less" film to teachers while API funded the association's educational website for kids.</div><div>
</div><div>Some of API's largest corporate members, including Chevron and Shell, remain top sponsors of the teachers association. Evans, who has led the association since 2013, said he was unable to comment on the organization's past, but defended the group's independence today: "It's NSTA that decides what the content should be."</div><div>
</div><div>'Win-win'</div><div>
</div><div>With only 14 seniors, the class of 2016 came nowhere near filling a gymnasium in Salineville, Ohio—a town of 1,300 about 50 miles west of Pittsburgh. "In this region, there are phenomenal opportunities," said Rhonda Reda, delivering the keynote speech at the Utica Shale Academy graduation. "Go out there and make a difference."</div><div>
</div><div>Named after the rock formation that stretches from eastern Ohio to Canada, the tuition-free charter school founded in 2014 promises "real opportunity" outside of "traditional settings." Instead of hitting textbooks, students work on drilling certifications and intern for oil companies. Attendance is flexible: students must spend more than half their time on campus—an increase from a previous requirement of at least 15 hours weekly.</div><div>
</div><div>The academy rents space from two high schools. A third location for K-12 students was shuttered last June after just a year in operation. The academy's website prominently displays the logos of corporate partners like Chesapeake Energy, whose executives meet with school administrators to help carve out the curriculum for the year.</div><div>
</div><div>One of the academy's most prominent sponsors, the Ohio Oil and Gas Energy Education Program—led by Reda—has stirred up criticism for its pro-drilling message. Like the Oklahoma energy resources board, the Ohio group is industry-funded, state-sanctioned and conducts free teacher workshops. In a meeting with state legislators in 2016, Reda said that 2,700 teachers statewide had attended the workshops since 1997.</div><div>
</div><div>Lisa Hoyos of Climate Parents, an affiliate of the Sierra Club that successfully petitioned Radio Disney to sever ties with Reda's group in 2014, criticized educational content that pushes petroleum's benefits but sidesteps its downsides. "They're basically indoctrinating children," she said of the Ohio program. "All the materials [the program is] putting out are about oil and gas, which are the chief culprits, along with coal, in causing climate change."</div><div>
</div><div>Before founding the Ohio program in 1997, Reda handled public affairs for the state's Oil and Gas Association. She sits on the communications committee for the Independent Petroleum Association of America, which created Energy in Depth—a website run by a public-relations firm that aggressively disputes industry criticism and news media reports, including investigative work done by the Center for Public Integrity. Reda's program helped launch Energy in Depth's Ohio section in 2011.</div><div>
</div><div>Reda declined to elaborate on her relationship with lobby groups, but wrote in an email that her organization "does not utilize any taxpayer dollars" and "does not lobby the legislature or take positions on regulatory or public policy." She added that her program "may elect on occasion to collaborate with other oil and gas groups, educational institutions and other experts on specific projects."</div><div>
</div><div>Reda's group has helped develop lessons for the National Energy Education Development Project, or NEED, a nonprofit that publishes thousands of pages of K-12 energy lessons online. A 2015 NEED lesson teaches students how to 'frack' a frozen layer cake using chocolate syrup and a syringe-like turkey injector—not unlike Ohio's demonstration using Twinkies.</div><div>
</div><div>Oil and gas companies are among NEED's most prominent backers. ConocoPhillips has sponsored NEED workshops since 2008, exposing educators nationwide to packets like "Oil, Gas and their Energy" and "Exploring Oil and Gas." A 2014 NEED guide tells of Sue Ann, who is a sticky pool of oil waiting to be freed, and Stacey, who wants to follow in her father's footsteps and become a blowout specialist on an offshore rig.</div><div>
</div><div>Executive Director Mary Spruill said NEED teams up with industry groups to train future workers, but the groups don't play a substantial role in developing content. "We don't send drafts to our partners," she said.</div><div>
</div><div>Like Reda, Spruill does not have an education or science background. Lessons from both their groups have been adapted by the "Arkansas Energy Rocks!" website dedicated to teaching kids about the "thriving oil and natural gas industry." Lessons include, "Just a little oil spill," which uses drops of vegetable oil in a pie plate filled with water to simulate an offshore oil spill, and "Persuasion POWER!" which highlights the legislative process with a congressional press release titled, "Consumers desperate for new natural gas pipelines." It's unclear how many schools are using the materials.</div><div>
</div><div>The website is a project of the Arkansas Energy Education Foundation, a nonprofit arm of the Arkansas Independent Producers & Royalty Owners. The program's logo and website are registered to the American Petroleum Institute. Listed as a contact for an all-expenses-paid teachers' workshop in 2015 promoting "Arkansas Energy Rocks!" was the personal email address of Paige Miller, an API public-affairs specialist based in Little Rock.</div><div>
</div><div>Spruill works closely with the Independent Petroleum Association of America, sitting on an advisory board for the lobby group's five "Petroleum Academies." IPAA, whose chief executive and lobbyist, Barry Russell, is co-chair of the advisory board, has billed the academies as a "win-win" for high schoolers and oil companies in Houston and Fort Worth.</div><div>
</div><div>Students are encouraged to put themselves in industry leaders' shoes by competing for lucrative leasing deals as fictional oil companies and delivering oral presentations on topics like "clearing misconceptions of the oil and gas industry."</div><div>
</div><div>Despite the hard sell, some students are unsure of their prospects in the petroleum industry. The ongoing oil-price slump has made jobs in the industry scarce and advancements in automation are expected to accelerate the trend.</div><div>
</div><div>Even in a state built on fossil fuels, other career options have grown more appealing. Having interviewed administrators at the academies, the Houston Chronicle reported last year that "students were gravitating more toward climate-friendly subjects like algae-based biofuel and super-efficient tiny houses."</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>no img</div><div>
</div><div>cartoon graphic pipeschool</div><div>
</div><div>https://www.ecowatch.com/oil-industry-influence-school-2442333774.html</div><div>
</div><div>Merritt's first-graders at Jefferson Elementary School in Pryor, Oklahoma, were in for a treat. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, the students gathered in late November for story time with two special guests: state Rep. Tom Gann and state Sen. Marty Quinn.</div><div>
</div><div>Dressed in suits, the Republican lawmakers read aloud from "Petro Pete's Big Bad Dream," a parable in which a Bob the Builder lookalike awakens to find his toothbrush, hardhat and even the tires on his bike missing. Abandoned by the school bus, Pete walks to Petroville Elementary in his pajamas.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>State Rep. Tom Gann and State Sen. Marty Quinn read aloud to first graders at Jefferson Elementary School in Pryor, Oklahoma</div><div>Oklahoma Energy Resources Board</div><div>
</div><div>"It sounds like you are missing all of your petroleum by-products today!" his teacher, Mrs. Rigwell, exclaims, extolling oil's benefits to Pete and fellow students like Sammy Shale. Before long, Pete decides that "having no petroleum is like a nightmare!"</div><div>The tale is the latest in an illustrated series by the Oklahoma Energy Resources Board, a state agency funded by oil and gas producers. The board has spent upwards of $40 million over the past two decades on K-12 education with a pro-industry bent, including hundreds of pages of curricula, a speaker series and an afterschool program—all at no cost to educators.</div><div>
</div><div>A similar program in Ohio shows teachers how to "frack" Twinkies using straws to pump for cream and advises on the curriculum for a charter school that revolves around shale drilling. A national program whose sponsors include BP and Shell claims it's too soon to tell if the earth is heating up, but "a little warming might be a good thing."</div><div>
</div><div>Decades of documents reviewed by the Center for Public Integrity reveal a tightly woven network of organizations that works in concert with the oil and gas industry to paint a rosy picture of fossil fuels in America's classrooms. Led by advertising and public-relations strategists, the groups have long plied the tools of their trade on impressionable children and teachers desperate for resources.</div><div>
</div><div>Proponents of programs like the one in Oklahoma say they help the oil and gas industry replenish its aging workforce by stirring early interest in science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM. But some experts question the educational value and ethics of lessons touting an industry that plays a central role in climate change and air pollution.</div><div>
</div><div>Anthony Leiserowitz, director of the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, likened industry-sponsored curricula that ignore climate science to advertising. "You're exploiting that trusted relationship between the student and the teacher," he said. Leiserowitz—whose research has focused on how culture, politics and psychology impact public perception of the environment—said fossil-fuel companies have a stake in perpetuating a message of oil dependency.</div><div>
</div><div>As early as the 1940s, the industry's largest and most powerful lobby group targeted K-12 schools as a key element of its fledgling marketing strategy. By the 1960s, the American Petroleum Institute was looking to shake its reputation as a "monopoly which reaped excessive profits" and set out to cultivate a network of "thought leaders" that included educators, journalists, politicians and even clergy, according to an organizational history copyrighted by API in 1990.</div><div>
</div><div>The idea caught on. Hundreds of oil-and-gas-centric lesson plans are now available at the click of a mouse. The programs occupy a gray area between corporate sponsorship and promotion at a time when climate science has increasingly come under siege at the highest levels of government. On June 1, President Donald Trump, flanked by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrator—and former Oklahoma attorney general—Scott Pruitt, announced that the United States would withdraw from the Paris climate agreement.</div><div>
</div><div>"Teachers are taking their cues from the political situation around them," said Glenn Branch of the National Center for Science Education, a nonprofit that advocates for climate-change and evolution education. He pointed to a survey that found teachers in Republican counties and states are less likely to teach the scientific consensus on global warming—regardless of the educator's politics. "Teachers live in local communities, they're sensitive to the needs and desires of the people paying their paychecks."</div><div>
</div><div>Branch's group supports wide-scale adoption of Next Generation Science Standards, a joint effort by states and educational organizations to revamp K-12 science that has met with political backlash since the standards were published in 2013. Oklahoma is among a dozen states that have opted for watered-down versions, sometimes omitting provisions on evolution and the anthropogenic causes of global warming. Along with Colorado, Kansas and Montana, Oklahoma legislators have also championed bills requiring that educators teach "both sides" of those scientific concepts....</div><div>
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</div><div>A 2016 study confirmed that America's youth receive mixed messages on climate change. Nearly a third of middle- and high-school science teachers nationwide have wrongly suggested global warming is naturally occurring. A quarter have spent as much time rebutting evidence of warming as they have presenting it.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>Freddie Fuelless and Oliver Oilpatch</div><div>
</div><div>Schools and libraries across Oklahoma have received more than 9,000 complimentary copies of "Petro Pete's Big Bad Dream" since it was published last year. The story has been a hit with Jennifer Merritt's students, who won the storytelling visit from lawmakers after submitting a photo to the energy resources board via Facebook. Posing on a jungle gym, the students clutched stuffed animals and footballs—their "favorite petroleum by-products."</div><div>
</div><div>"It's not some boring thing," Merritt said of the board's "Little Bits" curriculum for kindergarten through second grade, which features alliterative characters like Freddie Fuelless and Oliver Oilpatch. Without it, she said, "I probably wouldn't have taught first graders about energy."</div><div>
</div><div>Merritt is among 14,000 Oklahoma teachers who have attended workshops on how to use what the board calls its "innovative, one-of-a-kind science and energy curriculum in their classrooms." Participants are reimbursed for supplies year-round and can register their classes for free museum field trips — so long as the exhibits highlight petroleum.</div><div>
</div><div>On a recent Saturday, a workshop was in session at Choctaw High School, east of Oklahoma City. The parking lot was bustling as teachers loaded their cars with heavy tubs, each stuffed with up to $1,200 worth of calculators, lab equipment and other materials. In classrooms, some teachers plotted oil-production trends while others watched bubbling brews simulating how the industry wrings oil from depleting fields.</div><div>
</div><div>In an email, board Chairman Danny Morgan wrote that the organization doesn't use public funds and "does not function like a typical agency." Under state law, half of its revenues from oil and gas producers are spent restoring abandoned oil wells. Morgan pointed to a board safety campaign aimed at preventing children from playing on dangerous pumpjacks that dot the state, writing, "if just one child is kept safe through the awareness this program created, it is well worth the effort."</div><div>
</div><div>While the board's curriculum enlightens students about the benefits of "black gold," their teachers are hard-pressed to find any information on climate change or other drawbacks of fossil fuels—even as Oklahoma struggles to curb a slew of man-made earthquakes tied to its fracking boom. Morgan, an oil company executive and a former state legislator, declined to say why the board's materials fail to address global warming.</div><div>
</div><div>Cheerleading for the industry has been central to the energy resources board's mission from the start. Lawmakers created the board in 1993 as a "privatized" state agency funded by a voluntary tax on local oil and gas producers to publicize the industry. Kansas, Illinois and Ohio followed suit with similar legislation.</div><div>
</div><div>But Oklahoma remains the epicenter of oil-industry puffery in the classroom. The board's curricula are used in an estimated 98 percent of Oklahoma school districts and have been adopted in neighboring Kansas. Records show that Oklahoma's energy resources board has pitched its programs and pro-industry ads to trade groups and legislators in Montana, Arkansas, North Dakota, Wyoming and Texas. Similar petroleum boards in Kansas, Illinois and Ohio declined to fulfill records requests filed by the center.</div><div>
</div><div>Oklahoma's board appears to have taken cues from the American Petroleum Institute—the country's leading oil and gas lobby group, representing more than 625 companies. The plot of "Big Bad Dream" bears uncanny similarities to API's 1996 educational film, Fuel-less: you can't be cool without fuel. Records show that the board's education director, who wrote "Big Bad Dream," has ordered hundreds of copies of Fuel-less to distribute locally—most recently in 2013.</div><div>
</div><div>API's vice president of communications delivered a special presentation to the board in 2012 on marketing strategies. The same year, an API lobbyist asked the board to host a fracking workshop on its behalf as part of the trade group's effort to reach out to legislators, regulators and other stakeholders nationwide. Morgan wrote that the board did not participate in the workshop because API "never followed up on the request." He added that the board itself doesn't engage in lobbying.</div><div>
</div><div>Copied on API's communications with the energy resources board was Bill Whitsitt, a Devon Energy executive who helped draft letters for then-state attorney general Pruitt. In 2014, The New York Times reported on Pruitt's extensive industry ties—which included oil and gas companies, utilities and lobby groups.</div><div>
</div><div>Where the board draws the line between industry promotion and youth education is unclear. While it spent $3.5 million for K-12 efforts in 2016, roughly the same amount went to messaging it calls "public education." Its contract with Oklahoma-based Brothers & Company—which creates its pro-industry commercials and some K-12 materials—forbids the advertising firm to perform work for other clients that "portrays the oil and natural gas exploration and production industry in an unfavorable light." Brothers & Company counts among its clients Kansas Strong, an oil and gas marketing group similar to Oklahoma's; apparel company Under Armour; and handgun maker Remington.</div><div>
</div><div>Last spring, Brothers & Company rolled out an ad campaign highlighting petroleum's benefits and based on Alex Epstein's The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels. Epstein is a libertarian writer whose work is popular with climate-change deniers and who falsely claims that rising carbon dioxide levels have yielded only "mild and manageable" warming.</div><div>
</div><div>A Brothers & Company official wrote in an email that the firm's work for the energy resources board helps "citizens better understand domestic oil and natural gas production."</div><div>
</div><div>The firm also developed videos on Oklahoma's "seismicity issue" after the state was rattled by more than 900 earthquakes in 2015 and polls showed the matter was dampening the industry's "brand." Energy resources board members insisted that no cause for the seismic uptick be cited in the videos. Records show that Morgan cautioned his colleagues to be "careful not to state anything that someone might misconstrue and attempt to use in a court case." Soon afterward, state officials acknowledged that underground wells used for fracking waste likely were to blame....</div><div>
</div><div>Carla Schaeperkoetter, the energy resources board's education director, is the creator of "Big Bad Dream" and "Lab Time with Leo"—a video series featuring a bowtie-wearing scientist not unlike Bill Nye the Science Guy. Instead of exploring fundamentals like the solar system, Leo delves into the nuances of oil refining, teaching kids as young as eight about "fractional distillation" and "residuals."</div><div>
</div><div>Like her predecessor, Schaeperkoetter doesn't have any teaching experience and isn't a state employee. Board staff—including Schaeperkoetter—are consultants hired by a private foundation affiliated with the Oklahoma Independent Petroleum Association. The state trade group is listed as a partner of the Independent Petroleum Association of America, a lobbying organization that worked closely with API to roll back federal rules on fracking.</div><div>
</div><div>Schaeperkoetter's name appears on curricula reassuring teachers that "companies are spending more dollars protecting the environment than drilling new wells." A jump-rope rhyme reads, "We need oil. We need gas. Where are the oil products in our class?" And a high school guide asks students to create 30-second commercials on how "new technologies to find oil and natural gas will help America be energy independent."</div><div>
</div><div>Charles W. Anderson—a professor at Michigan State University who studies environmental literacy and develops curricula—said the board materials are upfront about their pro-industry agenda but only tell "half the story" by omitting global issues like climate change in favor of niche oil knowledge. "The children of Oklahoma are getting a raw deal—they are getting educationally ineffective materials teaching content that will be of little use to them if they want to leave the state," Anderson said.</div><div>
</div><div>Students also are being sold short in more immediate ways: an increasing number of Oklahoma districts are adopting four-day school weeks amid budget cuts due partly to tax breaks for the petroleum industry. "The state government of Oklahoma, in its wisdom, has decided that oil and gas companies should have a whole lot of money and schools should have hardly any money," Anderson said. "That's a social decision that values oil and gas extraction over the public good of public schools."</div><div>
</div><div>Oklahoma's State Department of Education promotes energy board lessons online and in newsletters. Though the curricula are described by the board as having been developed in "a collaborative effort" with the state, the education department has "not reviewed, endorsed or had any oversight" over the materials in two decades, spokeswoman Anne Price said.</div><div>
</div><div>"We value curricula that align to our state standards and are at no cost to educators, but ultimately we encourage educators to investigate further to choose what is best for their classrooms," Price wrote in an email.</div><div>
</div><div>Without explicit guidance, experts say, it's difficult for educators to assess which materials are appropriate—especially elementary-school teachers who don't have extensive science training. Historically, K-12 energy curricula have been scarce, leaving a window open for groups looking to mold young minds.</div><div>
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</div><div>"This provides an opportunity for anyone who has a particular point of view, whether it's an oil company or an environmental concern," said David Evans, executive director of the National Science Teachers Association, which co-developed the Next Generation Science Standards. Both the association and the standards are supported by corporate money.</div><div>
</div><div>The standards specify which concepts students should grasp by grade level—like the greenhouse effects of gases like carbon dioxide and methane—but don't provide curricula, leaving educators to find or create lessons themselves. So far, the standards have been adopted by 18 states and the District of Columbia.</div><div>
</div><div>When it comes to climate change, Evans urges teachers to stick to facts and avoid politics. "Science is about understanding the physical world that we live in," he said. "We wouldn't say, 'Why should people understand gravity?'"</div><div>
</div><div>But education is inherently political, said Nicole Colston, a researcher at Oklahoma State University who has studied overlap between groups that push against evolution and climate change education. "It's this implied thing that you can't talk about climate change," she said of her interviews with Oklahoma teachers. "It's almost, like, impolite or uncomfortable."</div><div>
</div><div>Prominent Oklahomans like Pruitt and Republican U.S. Sen. James Inhofe are climate-science deniers, a fact not lost on the state's residents. Just 46 percent of adult Oklahomans believe global warming is caused mostly by human activities, below the national average of 53 percent, according to 2016 data from the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication.</div><div>
</div><div>In 2014, Oklahoma lawmakers tried but failed to block the state board of education from adopting its version of Next Generation Science Standards. The same year, a state law was passed to give local school districts ultimate authority over curricula.</div><div>
</div><div>Merritt said she chose to use energy resources board materials because they were age-appropriate, factual and free. "It's just a way of life," she said of the curriculum's laser focus on petroleum. "We live in Oklahoma. There's a lot of oil."</div><div>
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</div><div>
</div><div>[fun vintage video and pix, mr science</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>'The Magic Suitcase'</div><div>
</div><div>Smiling broadly, the host pulls item after item from two large drums. Plastic wrap, shingles, Lucite—all "modern day miracles" made possible by oil and petrochemicals. Three minutes into the muted-color film, the man in the tan suit and plaid tie pours Freon-12 from a pressurized canister.</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>https://www.desmogblog.com/2017/06/13/epa-chief-scott-pruitt-red-team-climate-science-eight-year-old-talking-point-heartland-institute</div><div>
</div><div>[“We concluded we have to go after the science,” he said, adding Heartland’s “products and programs” would look to reach “all the way down to elementary school classrooms.” In recent weeks, Heartland has been mailing a condensed version of its NIPCC report to tens of thousands of school teachers across the country.]</div><div>
</div><div>Like many of his Trump administration colleagues, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) chief Scott Pruitt has never really been down with the whole climate science thing.</div><div>
</div><div>Pruitt has denied that carbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning is the key driver of climate change, instead hedging his bets with an assortment of ifs, buts, and maybes.</div><div>
</div><div>Now, Pruitt is suggesting that what the American public really needs is more debate, more false equivalence, and more delay on policies to cut greenhouse gas emissions.</div><div>
</div><div>In an interview on a Breitbart online radio segment, Pruitt has backed the idea of pitting climate science deniers up against actual climate scientists in what he called a “Red Team, Blue Team” debate.</div><div>
</div><div>Citing an idea from a column in the Wall Street Journal, Pruitt suggested “those scientists get into a room and ask, ‘What do we know? What don’t we know? What risk does it pose to health in the United States and the world, with respect to this issue of CO2?’”</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>According to Pruitt, this would be a “true, legitimate, peer reviewed, objective, transparent discussion about CO2” — a discussion “the American people deserve.”</div><div>
</div><div>On the face of it, the suggestion might seem reasonable.  What’s wrong with a good old debate, right?</div><div>
</div><div>Before we look at the people who have been pushing this “red team” idea, it’s worth clarifying something.</div><div>
</div><div>The Real Red Team</div><div>
</div><div>A version of this “red team” process already exists, and it’s called scientific peer review. </div><div>
</div><div>Scientists do research, write-up their findings, and submit them to a journal. The journal sends the paper to other qualified scientists who critique the work, sometimes mercilessly. That work may get published; at which point other scientists can build on the findings or find ways to reject them.</div><div>
</div><div>This is partly why, after the publication of tens of thousands of research papers going back a century or more, science academies and institutions around the world agree that global warming is real, is caused by humans, and is a serious problem.</div><div>
</div><div>So in the blue corner, you have all the credible and reasonable science, and in the red corner, you have something else.</div><div>
</div><div>In reality, the climate science denial industry has been touting itself as a viable “red team” for more than a decade. </div><div>
</div><div>Media Matters for America (MMFA), a think tank that monitors media outlets for “conservative misinformation,” has traced some of the history of the “red team” talking point back to a 2014 submission to the EPA from Professor John Christy, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.</div><div>
</div><div>After the submission, Christy continued to promote the idea in congressional testimony and to receptive media, says MMFA.</div><div>
</div><div>Heartland Institute as the Red Team</div><div>
</div><div>But before all this, one of America’s most notorious groups pushing climate science denial — the Heartland Institute — was touting the “red team” concept.</div><div>
</div><div>Since 2009, Heartland has been paying contrarian scientists to produce a report that specifically aims to undermine the scientific assessments produced by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).</div><div>
</div><div>Heartland calls its reports the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC). Others call them cherry-picked, selective pseudo-science.</div><div>
</div><div>In Heartland’s first NIPCC report in 2009, the group framed their critique as an innocent and disinterested “Team B.”</div><div>
</div><div>“It is a time-honored tradition in science to set up a ‘Team B’ which examines the same original evidence but may reach a different conclusion,” the preface mused.</div><div>
</div><div>In a follow-up 2011 “interim report,” Heartland again touted its credentials as a “Team B,” explaining its formative roots at a meeting in Milan in 2003 organized by Fred Singer and his Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP).</div><div>
</div><div>But in the following 2013 report — Climate Change Reconsidered II — the language had been tweaked. What was “Team B” was now a “Red Team.”</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>Heartland's 2013 NIPCC report used the term “red team.”</div><div>
</div><div>Long-serving Heartland scientist and NIPCC coordinator, the late Australian Dr. Bob Carter, wrote about the “red team” in a September 2013 column for the Rupert Murdoch–owned tabloid, the Daily Telegraph, based in Sydney.</div><div>
</div><div>Carter wrote: “In classic Green Team: Red Team tactical management style, the NIPCC has the role of providing an alternative Red Team view of the science of global warming, acting as a sort of 'defense counsel' to verify and counter the arguments mounted for climate alarm by the IPCC's Green Team prosecution.”</div><div>
</div><div>China Crisis</div><div>
</div><div>Later that year, Carter was in California to present the NIPCC report to the Ayn Rand Institute, alongside Singer and Heartland president Joe Bast.</div><div>
</div><div>Bast outlined how his institute had identified climate change in the early 90s as “the mother of all environmental scare stories” but then suggested the science was actually a sinister cover for something else entirely.</div><div>
</div><div>“Groups on the left understand if we can control energy, you can control human beings, and that’s what it was all about,” claimed Bast.</div><div>
</div><div>Environmentalists were trying to “shut down the engines of the world,” Bast said, without saying why they might want to do any of those things.</div><div>
</div><div>“This was a search for a scientific justification for a political agenda,” Bast added. “The whole idea is to control energy.” (As a group that tirelessly defends the use of fossil fuels while attacking renewable energy, you have to wonder if it’s actually Heartland that wants to “control energy.”)</div><div>
</div><div>“We concluded we have to go after the science,” he said, adding Heartland’s “products and programs” would look to reach “all the way down to elementary school classrooms.” In recent weeks, Heartland has been mailing a condensed version of its NIPCC report to tens of thousands of school teachers across the country.</div><div>
</div><div>Bast told the room that two NIPCC reports had been “peer reviewed by the authors themselves,” which, by the way, is not how peer review works.</div><div>
</div><div>Bast said the NIPCC report had been “translated by the Chinese Academy of Sciences” while his communications director, Jim Lakely, held the Chinese version aloft.</div><div>
</div><div>After a round of applause, Bast said he hoped “other academies of science,” including Australia, would follow suit, implying the Chinese Academy of Sciences had somehow endorsed the report.</div><div>
</div><div>At the time of the Chinese version being released, Bast had issued a press release claiming a “historic moment” for global warming science. He sent Heartland staff, including Carter, to Beijing for a press opportunity.</div><div>
</div><div>But as DeSmog reported, the CAS issued a statement saying:  “The claim of the Heartland Institute about CAS’ endorsement of its report is completely false.”</div><div>
</div><div>Bast was forced to apologize and had to pull the publication from his website and withdraw the original press release. But once Carter was out of China, Bast re-issued the press release and rejected the criticisms of the CAS.</div><div>
</div><div>Oddly, none of this detail made its way into Bast’s opening remarks.</div><div>
</div><div>Fake Discussion</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>Four Democratic senators are sharply criticizing a conservative think tank’s efforts to bring climate change skepticism into the nation’s public schools as “industry funded” and “possibly fraudulent” and demanding to know whether federal education officials have been in contact with the group.</div><div>
</div><div>The Heartland Institute has been sending books, DVDs and pamphlets to science teachers across the country promoting its stance that climate change is caused by natural phenomena rather than human activities — a view rejected by nearly all climate scientists. Heartland’s campaign to influence how climate science is taught in public schools was first reported by FRONTLINE and The GroundTruth Project in March.</div><div>
</div><div>The Illinois-based non-profit vows to continue its efforts, saying it has already sent more than 300,000 packages to K-12 and college-level science teachers since the launch of the campaign earlier this year. Mailings have wrapped up for the summer break, according to Heartland spokesman Jim Lakely. He added, however, “This is not the end of Heartland’s efforts to bring balance to the climate debate in our schools, but just the beginning.”</div><div>
</div><div>In a letter sent to Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Wednesday, Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) — all of whom have been outspoken on climate change issues — described the campaign as an effort “to disseminate fossil-fuel industry talking points as curriculum for science teachers.”</div><div>
</div><div>The senators asked DeVos whether any Education Department officials have had contact with individuals associated with the Heartland Institute “on climate, science, or science education issues,” and whether any informational resources put out by the department have been created in collaboration with Heartland.</div><div>
</div><div>The senators also asked DeVos whether she was aware of any discussions between the White House staff and Heartland. In March, the group’s president and CEO, Joseph Bast, told FRONTLINE and GroundTruth, “We’re getting a lot of requests for expert opinion from the White House … That’s very new.”</div><div>
</div><div>Heartland was founded in 1984 and has a history of promoting causes that align with the interests of industry. In the 1990s, for instance, the organization lobbied against smoking bans, for which it was rewardedwith donations from tobacco company Philip Morris. Today, the group promotes a bevy of libertarian and conservative causes, including oneDeVos has spent years advocating for: The school choice movement, which would allow students to spend public dollars to attend private and religious schools.</div><div>
</div><div>But Heartland is perhaps best known for its position as a leader in the movement to reject the scientific consensus on global warming. Among the group’s arguments is that curbing greenhouse gases would damage the economy — the primary reason given by President Donald Trump last week for pulling out of the Paris climate accord.</div><div>
</div><div>DeVos has, until recently, been relatively quiet on her personal view about climate change. During her nomination process in January, she was asked by Whitehouse whether she believed that humans cause climate change. DeVos answered that because the Education Department has no jurisdiction over climate change, “I would respectfully defer to my colleagues in other agencies” on the issue, and noted that the department “is prohibited from dictating curricula in our nation’s schools.” States and school districts, rather than the Education Department, direct curricula and science standards.</div><div>
</div><div>However, last week DeVos issued a statement praising President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accord. “The announcement made today by the President is one more example of his commitment to rolling back the unrealistic and overreaching regulatory actions by the previous Administration,” the statement read.</div><div>
</div><div>It was that statement that prompted Whitehouse and his colleagues to write the letter, he said. “It raises at least a suggestion that there may be more mischief going on between the fossil fuel industry and its denial front groups and the administration through Secretary DeVos,” the senator said in an interview.</div><div>
</div><div>DeVos did not immediately respond to a request for comment.</div><div>
</div><div>Heartland declined to comment on whether anyone at the organization has corresponded or met with staff at the Education Department, but in a written statement Bast said that his organization stands by the materials it has sent to teachers, and will continue to send out copies as it sees fit. Bast said the senators’ letter consisted of “purely partisan rhetoric apparently aimed at undermining the presidency of Donald Trump,” and said that Whitehouse is guilty of the very thing Heartland has frequently been accused of: bringing “politics into high school classrooms.”</div><div>
</div><div>The senators’ letter isn’t the first Democratic condemnation of the mailing campaign: In April, three ranking Democrats in the House publicly urged Heartland to stop the mailing campaign</div><div>
</div><div>Whitehouse also sent letters to a dozen scientific and educational organizations to “alert” them to “factually inaccurate and scientifically unsound materials on climate change.” He said he worries that the Heartland materials will successfully sway some teachers’ opinions of climate change.</div><div>
</div><div>“It takes a bit of sincere effort to do the research and find how fraudulent many of their assertions are, and that’s an effort that busy teachers may not undertake,” he said. “So it leaves at least a passing impression in an innocent teacher’s mind that there may actually be something to this.”</div><div>
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</div><div>=</div><div>idso carter singer narita noon</div><div>
</div><div>http://www.alternet.org/environment/heartland-institute-peddling-misinformation-teachers-about-climate-change-again</div><div>
</div><div>...What if the information the student shared was not based on the best available evidence? Misinformation would begin to spread more widely. If corrected, the student might distrust the teacher who may have not known the source material was compromised.</div><div>This scenario is not fiction. It has happened and may still be occurring in some U.S. schools. Anyone concerned about this can learn more with an update forthcoming from those who keep track—the National Center for Science Education (NCSE).</div><div>
</div><div>According to the NCSE, during October 2013 educators received a packet chock full of misinformation about climate change. The report includes an abbreviation that looked similar to a highly respected source—the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)—for international climate assessments.</div><div>
</div><div>It has happened again (starting in March 2017). Many teachers found a packet in their mailbox with a report from the same group that spread the misinformation back in October 2013. This report has a “second edition” gold highlight with a cover image of water flowing over a dam and a misleading title....</div><div>
</div><div>Not Science” stamp on top of the report cover mailed to teachers during spring 2017. The report misrepresents the fact that nearly all climate scientists agree about human-driven climate change.</div><div>
</div><div>The report runs counter to the agreement among scientists who publish on climate change in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. More than 97% of scientists agree that climate change is caused by human activities</div><div>
</div><div>The Heartland Institute is infamous for its rejection of climate science and unsavory tactics. According to a reported statement by the CEO of Heartland Institute, they plan to keep sending out copies to educators over the weeks ahead.</div><div>
</div><div>If you see any student or teacher with this report or DVD please let NCSE know about it and share what you have learned to help stop the spread.</div><div>
</div><div>Brenda Ekwurzel is a senior climate scientist and the director of climate science at the Union of Concerned Scientists.</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>ref 2008 api</div><div>
</div><div>http://www.euronet.nl/users/e_wesker/ew@shell/API-prop.html</div><div>
</div><div>The material below contains a memo by the API from April 1998.</div><div>Memo</div><div>
</div><div>Joe Walker</div><div>
</div><div>To: Global Climate Science Team</div><div>Cc: Michelle Ross; Susan Moya</div><div>Subject: Draft Global Climate Science Communications plan</div><div>
</div><div>As promised, attached is the draft Global Climate Science Communications Plan that we developed during our workshop Last Friday. Thanks especially to those of you who participated in the workshop, and In particular to John Adams for his very helpful thoughts following up our meeting, and Alan Caudill for turning around the notes from our workshop so quickly.</div><div>
</div><div>Please review the pan and get back to me with your comments as soon as possible.</div><div>
</div><div>As those of you who were at the workshop know, we have scheduled a follow - up team meeting to review the plan in person on Friday, April 17, form 1 to 3 p.m. at the API headquarters. After that, we hope to have a "plan champion" help us move it forward to potential funding sources, perhaps starting with the global climate "Coordinating Council." That will be an item for discussion on April 17.</div><div>
</div><div>Again, thanks for your hard work on this project. Please e-mail me, call or fax me with your comments. Thanks.</div><div>
</div><div>Regards,</div><div>Joe Walker</div><div>
</div><div>Global Climate Science Communications</div><div>
</div><div>Action Plan</div><div>
</div><div>Situation Analysis</div><div>
</div><div>In December 1997, the Clinton Administration agreed in Kyoto, Japan, to a treaty to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to prevent what it purports to be changes in the global climate caused by the continuing release of such emissions. The so-called green house gases have many sources. For example, water vapor is a greenhouse gas. But the Clinton Administration's action, if eventually approved by the U.S. Senate, will mainly affect emissions from fossil fuel (gasoline, coal, natural gas, etc.) combustion.</div><div>As the climate change debate has evolved, those who oppose action have argued mainly that signing such a treaty will place the U.S. at a competitive disadvantage with most other nations, and will be extremely expensive to implement. Much of the cost will be borne by American consumers who will pay higher prices for most energy and transportation.</div><div>
</div><div>The climate change theory being advanced by the treaty supporters is based primarily on forecasting models with a very high degree of uncertainty. In fact, its not known for sure whether (a) climate change actually is occurring, or (b) if it is, whether humans really have any influence on it.</div><div>
</div><div>Despite these weaknesses in scientific understanding, those who oppose the treaty have done little to build a case against precipitous action on climate change based on the scientific uncertainty. As a result, The Clinton Administration and environmental groups essentially have had the field to themselves. They have conducted an effective public relations program to convince the American public that the climate is changing, we humans are at fault, and we must do something about it before calamity strikes.</div><div>
</div><div>The environmental groups know they have been successful. Commenting after the Kyoto negotiations about recent media coverage of climate change, Tom Wathen, executive vice president of the National Environmental Trust, wrote:</div><div>
</div><div>"...As important as the extent of the coverage was the tone and tenor of it. In a change from just six months ago, most media stories no longer presented global warming as just a theory over which reasonable scientists could differ. Most stories described predictions of global warming as the position of the overwhelming number of mainstream scientists. That the environmental community had, to a great extent, settled the scientific issue with the U.S. media is the other great success that began perhaps several months earlier but became apparent during Kyoto."</div><div>
</div><div>Because the science underpinning the global climate change theory has not been challenged effectively in the media or through other vehicles reaching the American public, there is widespread ignorance, which works in favor of the Kyoto treaty and against the best interests of the United States. Indeed, the public has been highly receptive to the Clinton Administrations plans. There has been little, if any, public resistance or pressure applied to Congress to reject the treaty, except by those "inside the Beltway" with vested interests.</div><div>
</div><div>Moreover, from the political viewpoint, it is difficult for the United States to oppose the treaty solely on economic grounds, valid as the economic issues are. It makes it too easy for others to portray the United States as putting preservation of its own lifestyle above the greater concerns of mankind. This argument, in turn, forces our negotiators to make concessions that have not been well thought through, and in the end may do far more harm than good. This is the process that unfolded at Kyoto, and is very likely to be repeated in Buenos Aires in November 1998.</div><div>
</div><div>The advocates of global warming have been successful on the basis of skillfully misrepresenting the science and the extent of agreement on the science, while industry and its partners ceded the science and fought on the economic issues. Yet if we can show that science does not support the Kyoto treaty - which most true climate scientists believe to be the case - this puts the United States in a stronger moral position and frees its negotiators from the need to make concessions as a defense against perceived selfish economic concerns.</div><div>
</div><div>Upon this tableau, the Global Climate Science Communications Team (GCSCT) developed an action plan to inform the American public that science does not support the precipitous actions Kyoto would dictate, thereby providing a climate for the right policy decisions to be made. The team considered results from a new public opinion survey in developing the plan.</div><div>
</div><div>Charlton Research's survey of 1,100 "informed Americans" suggests that while Americans currently perceive climate change to be a great threat, public opinion is open enough to change on climate science. When informed that "some scientists believe there is not enough evidence to suggest that [what is called global climate change] is a long-term change due to human behavior and activities," 58 percent of those surveyed said they were more likely to oppose the Kyoto treaty. Moreover, half the respondents harbored doubts about climate science.</div><div>
</div><div>GCSCT members who contributed to the development of the plan are A. John Adams, John Adams Associates; Candace Crandall, Science and Environmental Policy Project; David Rothbard, Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow; Jeffrey Salmon, The Marshall Institute; Lee Garrigan, environmental issues Council; Lynn Bouchey and Myron Ebell, Frontiers of Freedom; Peter Cleary, Americans for Tax Reform; Randy Randol, Exxon Corp.; Robert Gehri, The Southern Company; Sharon Kneiss, Chevron Corp; Steve Milloy, The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition; and Joseph Walker, American Petroleum Institute.</div><div>
</div><div>The action plan is detailed on the following pages.</div><div>
</div><div>Global Climate Science Communications</div><div>
</div><div>Action Plan</div><div>
</div><div>Project Goal</div><div>
</div><div>A majority of the American public, including industry leadership, recognizes that significant uncertainties exist in climate science, and therefore raises questions among those (e.g. Congress) who chart the future U.S. course on global climate change.</div><div>Progress will be measured toward the goal. A measurement of the public's perspective on climate science will be taken before the plan is launched, and the same measurement will be taken at one or more as-yet-to-be-determined intervals as the plan is implemented,</div><div>
</div><div>Victory Will Be Achieved When</div><div>
</div><div>Average citizens "understand" (recognize) uncertainties in climate science; recognition of uncertainties becomes part of the "conventional wisdom"</div><div>Media "understands" (recognizes) uncertainties in climate science</div><div>Media coverage reflects balance on climate science and recognition of the validity of viewpoints that challenge the current "conventional wisdom"</div><div>Industry senior leadership understands uncertainties in climate science, making them stronger ambassadors to those who shape climate policy</div><div>Those promoting the Kyoto treaty on the basis of extent science appears to be out of touch with reality.</div><div>Current Reality</div><div>
</div><div>Unless "climate change" becomes a non-issue, meaning that the Kyoto proposal is defeated and there are no further initiatives to thwart the threat of climate change, there may be no moment when we can declare victory for our efforts. It will be necessary to establish measurements for the science effort to track progress toward achieving the goal and strategic success.</div><div>
</div><div>Strategies and Tactics</div><div>
</div><div>I. National Media Relations Program: Develop and implement a national media relations program to inform the media about uncertainties in climate science; to generate national, regional and local media coverage on the scientific uncertainties, and thereby educate and inform the public, stimulating them to raise questions with policy makers.</div><div>
</div><div>Tactics: These tactics will be undertaken between now and the next climate meeting in Buenos Aires/Argentina, in November 1998, and will be continued thereafter, as appropriate. Activities will be launched as soon as the plan is approved, funding obtained, and the necessary resources (e.g., public relations counsel) arranged and deployed. In all cases, tactical implementation will be fully integrated with other elements of this action plan, most especially Strategy II (National Climate Science Data Center).</div><div>
</div><div>Identify, recruit and train a team of five independent scientists to participate in media outreach. These will be individuals who do not have a long history of visibility and/or participation in the climate change debate. Rather, this team will consist of new faces who will add their voices to those recognized scientists who already are vocal.</div><div>
</div><div>Develop a global climate science information kit for media including peer-reviewed papers that undercut the "conventional wisdom"on climate science. This kit also will include understandable communications, including simple fact sheets that present scientific uncertainties in language that the media and public can understand.</div><div>Conduct briefings by media-trained scientists for science writers in the top 20 media markets, using the information kits. Distribute the information kits to daily newspapers nationwide with offer of scientists to brief reporters at each paper. Develop, disseminate radio news releases featuring scientists nationwide, and offer scientists to appear on radio talk shows across the country.</div><div>Produce, distribute a steady stream of climate science information via facsimile and e-mail to science writers around the country.</div><div>Produce, distribute via syndicate and directly to newspapers nationwide a steady stream of op-ed columns and letters to the editor authored by scientists.</div><div>Convince one of the major news national TV journalists (e.g., John Stossel ) to produce a report examining the scientific underpinnings of the Kyoto treaty.</div><div>Organize, promote and conduct through grassroots organizations a series of campus/community workshops/debates on climate science in 10 most important states during the period mid-August through October, 1998.</div><div>Consider advertising the scientific uncertainties in select markets to support national, regional and local (e.g., workshops / debates), as appropriate.</div><div> </div><div>National Media Program Budget -- $600,000 plus paid advertising</div><div>
</div><div>II. Global Climate Science Information Source: Develop and implement a program to inject credible science and scientific accountability into the global climate debate, thereby raising questions about and undercutting the "prevailing scientific wisdom." The strategy will have the added benefit of providing a platform for credible, constructive criticism of the opposition's position on the science.</div><div>
</div><div>Tactics: As with the National Media Relations Program, these activities will be undertaken between now and the next climate meeting in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in November 1998, and will continue thereafter. Initiatives will be launched as soon as the plan is approved, funding obtained, and the necessary resources arranged and deployed.</div><div>
</div><div>Establish a Global Climate Science Data Center. The GCSDC will be established in Washington as a non-profit educational foundation with an advisory board of respected climate scientists. It will be staffed initially with professionals on loan from various companies and associations with a major interest in the climate issue. These executives will bring with them knowledge and experience in the following areas.</div><div>Overall history of climate research and the IPCC process;</div><div>Congressional relations and knowledge of where individual Senators stand on the climate issue;</div><div>Knowledge of key climate scientists and where they stand;</div><div>Ability to identify and recruit as many as 20 respected climate scientists to serve on the science advisory board;</div><div>Knowledge and expertise in media relations and with established relationships with science and energy writers, columnists and editorial writers;</div><div>Expertise in grassroots organization; and</div><div>Campaign organization and administration.</div><div>The GCSDC will be led by dynamic senior executive with a major personal commitment to the goals of the campaign and easy access to business leaders at the CEO level. The Center will be run on a day-to-day basis by an executive director with responsibility for ensuring targets are met. The Center will be funded at a level that will permit it to succeed, including funding for research contracts that may be deemed appropriate to fill gaps in climate science (e.g., a complete scientific critique of the IPCC research and its conclusions).</div><div>
</div><div>The GCSDC will become a one-stop resource on climate science for members of Congress, the media, industry and all others concerned. It will be in constant contact with the best climate scientists and ensure that their findings and views receive appropriate attention. It will provide them with the logistical and moral support they have been lacking. In short, it will be a sound scientific alternative to the IPCC. Its functions will include:</div><div>Providing as an easily accessible database (including a website) of all mainstream climate science information.</div><div>Identifying and establishing cooperative relationships with all major scientists whose research in this field supports our position.</div><div>Establishing cooperative relationships with other mainstream scientific organizations (e.g., meteorologists, geophysicists) to bring their perspectives to bear on the debate, as appropriate.</div><div>Developing opportunities to maximize the impact of scientific views consistent with ours with Congress, the media and other key audiences.</div><div>Monitoring and serving as and early warning system for scientific developments with the potential to impact on the climate science debate, pro and con.</div><div>Responding to claims from the scientific alarmists and media.</div><div>Providing grants for advocacy on climate science, as deemed appropriate.</div><div>Global Climate Science Data Center Budget --- $5,000,000 (Spread over two years minimum)</div><div>
</div><div>III. National Direct Outreach and Education: Develop and implement a direct outreach program to inform and educate members of Congress, state officials, industry leadership, and school teachers/students about uncertainties in climate science. This strategy will enable Congress, state officials and industry leaders will be able to raise such serious questions about the Kyoto treaty's scientific underpinnings that American policy-makers not only will refuse to endorse it, they will seek to prevent progress toward implementation at the Buenos Aires meeting in November or through other ways. Informing teachers/students about uncertainties in climate science will begin to erect a barrier against further efforts to impose Kyoto-like measures in the future.</div><div>
</div><div>Tactics: Informing and educating members of Congress, state officials and industry leaders will be undertaken as soon as the plan is approved, funding is obtained, and the necessary resources are arrayed and will continue through Buenos Aires and for the foreseeable future. The teachers/students outreach program will be developed and launched in early 1999. In all cases, tactical implementation will be fully integrated with other elements of this action plan.</div><div>
</div><div>Develop and conduct through the Global Climate Science Data Center science briefings for Congress, governors, state legislators, and industry leaders by August 1998.</div><div>Develop information kits on climate science targeted specifically at the needs of government officials and industry leaders, to be used in conjunction with and separately from the in-person briefings to further disseminate information on climate science uncertainties and thereby arm these influentials to raise serious questions on the science issue.</div><div>Organize under the GCSDC a "Science Education Task Group" that will serve as the point of outreach to the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) and other influential science education organizations. Work with NSTA to develop school materials that present a credible, balanced picture of climate science for use in classrooms nationwide.</div><div>Distribute educational materials directly to schools and through grassroots organizations of climate science partners (companies, organizations that participate in this effort).</div><div>National Direct Outreach Program Budget ---- $300,000</div><div>
</div><div>IV. Funding/Fund Allocation: Develop and implement program to obtain funding, and to allocate funds to ensure that the program is carried out effectively.</div><div>
</div><div>Tactics: This strategy will be implemented as soon as we have the go-ahead to proceed.</div><div>
</div><div>Potential funding sources were identified as American Petroleum Institute (API) and its members; Business Round Table (BRT) and its members, Edison Electric Institute (EEI) and its members; Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA) and its members; and the National Mining Association (NMA) and its members.</div><div>Potential fund allocators were identified as the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), Competitive Enterprise Institute , Frontiers of Freedom and The Marshall Institute.</div><div>Total Funds Required to Implement Program through November 1998 ---- $2,000,000 ( A significant portion of funding for the GCSDC will be deferred until 1999 and beyond)</div><div>
</div><div>Measurements</div><div>
</div><div>Various metrics will be used to track progress. These measurements will have to be determined in fleshing out the action plan and may include:</div><div>Baseline public / government official opinion surveys and periodic follow-up surveys on the percentage of Americans and government officials who recognize significant uncertainties in climate science.</div><div>Tracking the percent of media articles that raise questions about climate science.</div><div>Number of Members of Congress exposed to our materials on climate science.</div><div>Number of communications on climate science received by Members of Congress from their constituents.</div><div>Number of radio talk show appearances by scientists questioning the "prevailing wisdom" on climate science.</div><div>Number of school teachers / students reached with our information on climate science.</div><div>Number of science writers briefed and who report upon climate science uncertainties.</div><div>Total audience exposed to newspaper, radio, television coverage of science uncertainties.</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/climate-change-skeptic-group-seeks-to-influence-200000-teachers/</div><div>
</div><div>Twenty-five thousand science teachers opened their mailboxes this month and found a package from the Heartland Institute, a libertarian think tank that rejects the scientific consensus on climate change.</div><div>
</div><div>It contained the organization’s book “Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming,” as well as a DVD rejecting the human role in climate change and arguing instead that rising temperatures have been caused primarily by natural phenomena. The material will be sent to an additional 25,000 teachers every two weeks until every public-school science teacher in the nation has a copy, Heartland president and CEO Joseph Bast said in an interview last week. If so, the campaign would reach more than 200,000 K-12 science teachers.</div><div>
</div><div>Accompanying the materials is a cover letter from Lennie Jarratt, project manager of Heartland’s Center for Transforming Education. He asks teachers to “consider the possibility” that the science is not settled. “If that’s the case, then students would be better served by letting them know a vibrant debate is taking place among scientists,” he writes. The letter also points teachers to an online guide to using the DVD in their classrooms.</div><div>
</div><div>The Heartland initiative dismisses multiple studies showing scientists are in near unanimous agreement that humans are changing the climate. Even if human activity is contributing to climate change, the book argues, it “would probably not be harmful, because many areas of the world would benefit from or adjust to climate change.”</div><div>
</div><div>The campaign elicited immediate derision from the National Center for Science Education (NCSE), a nonprofit in Oakland, California that monitors climate change education in classrooms.</div><div>
</div><div>“It’s not science, but it’s dressed up to look like science,” said NCSE executive director Ann Reid. “It’s clearly intended to confuse teachers.”</div><div>
</div><div>It’s too early to know how the materials will be used in schools around the country. There aren’t uniform standards for teaching climate change, and the subject has caused rigorous debate in some states. Even when it is taught, Reid says, “what goes on behind the classroom door is really up to the teacher.”</div><div>
</div><div>The campaign comes at a time when Heartland’s influence on national climate policy is at an apex. Myron Ebell, a leading climate change skeptic and a longtime ally of the Heartland Institute, ran President Donald Trump’s transition efforts for the Environmental Protection Agency. That process led to the appointment of climate change skeptic Scott Pruitt as administrator of the EPA. Pruitt, a former Oklahoma attorney general, has publicly questioned the scientific consensus around climate change, and has brought in like-minded officials who support dismantling policies that curb fossil fuel emissions.</div><div>
</div><div>Trump took a major step toward that goal on Tuesday when he signed an executive order rolling back the Clean Power Plan, an Obama administration initiative that aimed to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.</div><div>
</div><div>“We’re getting a lot of requests for expert opinion from the White House,” said Bast. “That’s very new. We haven’t had those calls for eight years. Even 12 years.”</div><div>
</div><div>Last week in Washington, D.C., Heartland held its annual conference challenging the idea that there is a scientific consensus on climate change. The conference focused on the future of energy and climate policy under Trump. Bast opened the meeting by saying, “This is a wonderful time to be a global warming realist,” using the term that those in the movement use to describe themselves.</div><div>
</div><div>“Those of us in the room who have been working on this issue for a decade or longer can finally stand up and say hallelujah and welcome to the party,” said Bast. He was met with applause from the 200 or so people in the audience.</div><div>
</div><div>This isn’t the first time the movement has targeted teachers. As early as 1998, a group of fossil fuel officials, lobbyists and conservative think tanks planned to distribute climate-change skeptical curricula for classrooms nationwide. In 2012, an internal Heartland document outlined plans to do the same.</div><div>
</div><div>Their message has been embraced by some educators. A survey of 1,500 science teachers nationwide, funded by NCSE and published in the journal Science last year, found more than half taught their students that humans are unequivocally causing climate change. But 31 percent of teachers told their students that the cause of climate change is still being debated. About one in 10 teachers teach children that humans had no significant role in climate change, the study showed.</div><div>
</div><div>The author of the survey, Eric Plutzer, professor of political science at Pennsylvania State University, said those results reflect the fact that climate change can be challenging to teach: It doesn’t slide neatly into any of the required sciences, comprising some biology, some chemistry and some physics. Science teachers themselves may not have encountered the science of climate change much in their own education.</div><div>
</div><div>Bast said he was not shocked that four in 10 teachers mention or advocate contrarian views, though he hesitated to take credit for it.</div><div>
</div><div>“Science teachers are smart. Smarter than the average reporter. Smarter than the average environmental activist,” he said.</div><div>
</div><div>Heartland’s mailing campaign began in mid-March. Bast declined to disclose the project cost; the book’s suggested retail price is $6.95. He said the group has been actively fundraising around educational initiatives. The organization’s total budget in 2015, the most recent year available through public filings, was $5.3 million.</div><div>
</div><div>Bast said the organization has already received several messages from teachers who appreciated the information, or asked for a Heartland speaker to come to class.</div><div>
</div><div>But the campaign is not being well received by everyone.</div><div>
</div><div>Lori Baker, a sixth-grade science teacher at North Putnam Middle School in Roachdale, Indiana, found the package in her school mailbox and was dismayed by its contents. “I read quite a bit of the book, actually, and it was extremely frustrating. It’s an attempt to sound science literate, but there’s very little actual data,” she said.</div><div>
</div><div>Baker pointed to the first paragraph of the foreword, written by Marita Noon, executive director of Citizens’ Alliance for Responsible Energy, a nonprofit and lobbying group that advocates for the use of fossil fuels. In it, Noon writes that Obama’s description of climate change as the greatest threat facing mankind is “laughable” at a time when “ISIS is beheading innocent people.”</div><div>
</div><div>“That as a foreword to something claiming to be scientific is pretty shocking,” said Baker.</div><div>
</div><div>Plutzer said the Heartland book is likely to be dismissed out of hand by teachers like Baker, who already view climate change denial as a fringe movement. But it may be welcomed by those already skeptical of the scientific consensus. “This could increase polarization within the science teaching profession, though probably not a great deal.”</div><div>
</div><div>That polarization could easily be exacerbated at South Whidbey High School in Washington state, where biology and physics teacher Greg Ballog received the material. Ballog said that one of his colleagues is a “borderline climate denier,” which has already caused tensions in the school’s science department.</div><div>
</div><div>“I’m not going to show this stuff to him,” he said. “It’s pretty slick. I think he might use it.”</div><div>
</div><div>This story was produced as part of a collaboration between FRONTLINE and The GroundTruth Project examining climate change and its impact on women and children.</div><div>
</div><div>Correction: An earlier version of this story mistakenly said that a 2012 Heartland strategy document was leaked to the press. Rather, the document was acquired from Heartland under false pretenses before being publicly released.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>=</div><div>http://www.ecowatch.com/heartland-institute-climate-science-2334892782.html</div><div>
</div><div>Koch-Funded Group Tries to Persuade 200,000 Science Teachers That Climate Change Is Debatable</div><div>The Heartland Institute is trying to nurture the next generation of climate change deniers.</div><div>
</div><div>The conservative and libertarian think tank has sent out 25,000 copies of the organization's book, Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming, and an accompanying 10-minute DVD to 25,000 science teachers this month, according to a Frontline report. The book argues that climate change is not settled science.</div><div>
</div><div>Katie Worth, who authored the Frontline report, called the effort a "massive propaganda campaign by the nation's leading climate change skeptical think tank."</div><div>
</div><div>The Heartland Institute, which has received funding from polluting industries such as Exxon and the Koch family, rejectsthe scientific community's widespread consensus that human activity causes climate change.</div><div>
</div><div>The organization plans to send the materials to another 25,000 teachers every two weeks until every public-school science teacher in the nation has a copy, Heartland president and CEO Joseph Bast said.</div><div>
</div><div>This means the book and DVD could end up in the mailboxes of more than 200,000 K-12 science teachers in the country. The campaign began in mid-March.</div><div>
</div><div>Frontline also published a cover letter of the materials from Lennie Jarratt, project manager of Heartland's Center for Transforming Education, who asks that the teacher "consider the possibility" that climate science is not settled.</div><div>img</div><div>
</div><div>The 2015 book is coauthored by Drs. Craig D. Idso, Robert M. Carter and S. Fred Singer, who have been heavily involved in the "debate" over global warming.</div><div>Here are some tidbits about the authors:</div><div>
</div><div>According to DeSmog, Idso believes that "CO2 is not a pollutant" and is the chairman and former resident of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, which has a mission is to "separate reality from rhetoric in the emotionally-charged debate that swirls around the subject of carbon dioxide and global change."</div><div>Carter, who passed away last year, was an Australian marine geologist and a paid climate change denier, SourceWatch noted. He once asserted that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has not found evidence that global warming was caused by human activity.</div><div>Singer, a former space scientist and government scientific administrator, founded the Science & Environmental Policy Project in 1990, a 501(c)(3) "educational group" focusing on global warming denial, according to DeSmog. Idso and Singer helped develop the Heartland Institute's "Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change. Singer said in Jan. 2016 that "the real threat to humanity comes not from any (trivial) greenhouse warming but from cooling periods creating food shortages and famines."</div><div>The letter directs teachers to visit Izzit.org to access an online guide to using the DVD. Izzit.org is a "right-wing advocacy organization" that provides free educational videos to U.S. educators and homeschoolers.</div><div>
</div><div>The National Center for Science Education, an Oakland, California nonprofit that monitors climate change education in classrooms criticized the mailing campaign.</div><div>
</div><div>"It's not science, but it's dressed up to look like science," NCSE executive director Ann Reid told Frontline. "It's clearly intended to confuse teachers."</div><div>
</div><div>Climatologist Michael Mann also tweeted that the Heartland Institute is trying to "indoctrinate children with climate denial propaganda."</div><div>
</div><div>Bast, Heartland's president, said that some teachers have appreciated the information and even asked for a Heartland speaker to visit a class.</div><div>
</div><div>However, many science teachers have not welcomed the campaign.</div><div>
</div><div>As Frontline wrote:</div><div>
</div><div>Lori Baker, a sixth-grade science teacher at North Putnam Middle School in Roachdale, Indiana, found the package in her school mailbox and was dismayed by its contents. "I read quite a bit of the book, actually, and it was extremely frustrating. It's an attempt to sound science literate, but there's very little actual data," she said. </div><div>
</div><div>Baker pointed to the first paragraph of the foreword, written by Marita Noon, executive director of Citizens' Alliance for Responsible Energy, a nonprofit and lobbying group that advocates for the use of fossil fuels. In it, Noon writes that Obama's description of climate change as the greatest threat facing mankind is "laughable" at a time when "ISIS is beheading innocent people."</div><div>
</div><div>"That as a foreword to something claiming to be scientific is pretty shocking," said Baker.</div><div>
</div><div></div><div></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">end</font></div><div><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"You may be able to note that it is boiling violently, just as water would boil on a stove," he says, holding up a glass of the clear liquid. "Yes, it's a safe refrigerant. I'll just pour some on my clothing. And now, watch the frost appear. I'll blow on it. Oh, it's cold all right."</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Scientists now know Freon is far from benign. Forms of the coolant are still being <a href="http://ozone.unep.org/en/treaties-and-decisions/montreal-protocol-substances-deplete-ozone-layer" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">phased out</a> after research in the 1980s found it was rapidly depleting the Earth's ozone layer. The volatile chemical is moderately toxic when inhaled.</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" /></font><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Shot in the 1960s, <em><a href="http://digital.hagley.org/islandora/object/islandora%3A2463581" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">The Magic Barrel</a> </em>promoted a one-man show of the same name developed by chemical giant DuPont for the American Petroleum Institute. By 1954, DuPont had trained <a href="http://digital.hagley.org/1954_48_05#page/22/mode/1up" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">600 oil-industry workers</a> to deliver the show-and-tell in classrooms, with 40 assigned to New York's 230 middle schools and high schools. The lecture was a fixture of Oil Progress Week, API's bygone annual celebration of all things petroleum.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Half a century later, a version of the demonstration—which uses a suitcase instead of a barrel and originally targeted women's groups—lives on. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlQ-5LjW8oE" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">YouTube videos</a> show the talk being delivered at elementary schools in West Virginia, a state <a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/jan/23/west-virginia-natural-gas-production-numbers-shock/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">embracing natural gas amid coal's decline</a>.<em>The Magic Suitcase </em>also has made the rounds in Texas, Wyoming, Louisiana, and most recently in Pennsylvania and Colorado.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">While oil and gas is not the only industry to market to young audiences, it is among the most prolific and enduring. Records detail API's early efforts to rehab the industry's image by influencing educators. In the 1950s, companies like DuPont worked hand in hand with API's budding public-relations division, which sent "flying squadrons" of industry representatives to schools nationwide, getting two million copies of API lessons into classrooms.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Inspiration for these squadrons sprang from a 1946 study surveying 10,000 Americans, according to the 1990 API history. The document's author wrote that, "the more people knew about the petroleum industry, the more favorable were their feelings towards it." To combat the industry's negative reputation, the study suggested "a well-directed program of public education was the right medicine to bring about a cure."</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.hkstrategies.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Hill & Knowlton</a>—the public-relations firm that would later <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/1994-09-18/magazine/tm-40179_1_tobacco-industry" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">help the tobacco industry</a> fend off cancer claims—was brought on to strategize. The firm surmised that the "petroleum industry's legislative difficulties could be traced to misunderstandings by government and the public" and laid out a plan to cultivate '"thought leaders' or 'opinion molders'—educators, editors, columnists, the clergy, business and financial leaders and, of course, key people in government," according to the 1990 document.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In 1960, educators helped revamp API materials that eventually made their way into 25,000 secondary schools. Advertisers were hired to <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3480569-3865-001.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">ghost-write scripts</a> hyping oil for popular children's programs like Art Linkletter's "House Party." The widely televised <a href="http://www.texasarchive.org/library/index.php/2011_02147" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;"><em>Odyssey: A Quest for Energy</em></a><em> </em>was among dozens of educational videos made available through API's vast regional network.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The 1982 film examined renewable energy, but made the best case for fossil fuels—urging that offshore drilling be expanded "into deeper waters" and that federal lands be opened for coal mining in promotional brochures sent to some 14,000 schools. Within months, more than 1,300 schools wanted to screen <em>Odyssey</em>. Indiana officials ordered enough kits to show the film to every high-schooler in the state. API's public relations team <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3480584-3851-001.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">meticulously tracked "Odyssey's" reach</a>, estimating that at least five million Americans saw the film.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">API did not respond to requests for comment.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">API's message was amplified with the help of an unlikely ally—the <a href="https://www.nsta.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">National Science Teachers Association</a>, which boasts some 55,000 members of mostly K-12 educators. The association worked closely with API and utility executives during the 1970s to develop <a href="http://energyeducationreferences.pbworks.com/w/page/33459812/NSTA%20PEEC" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">K-12 energy curricula</a>. When federal funding dried up in the 1980s, the association turned to corporate sponsors to cover costs.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As pressure to act on global warming mounted during the 1990s, API ramped up its strategy to quiet critics, including leveraging its relationship with the teachers association. Months after the language of a global climate treaty known as the <a href="http://unfccc.int/kyoto_protocol/items/2830.php" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Kyoto Protocol</a> was finalized in 1997, an internal <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20070715153809/http:/www.edf.org/documents/3860_GlobalClimateSciencePlanMemo.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">memo</a> obtained by The New York Times laid out API's plans to infuse doubt about climate change into K-12 materials. Less than a decade later, the association <a href="https://thinkprogress.org/science-teachers-organization-refuses-to-accept-copies-of-inconvenient-truth-b1d5926c104" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">garnered criticism</a> for distributing API's "Fuel-less" film to teachers while API funded the association's educational website for kids.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Some of API's largest corporate members, including Chevron and Shell, remain top sponsors of the teachers association. Evans, who has led the association since 2013, said he was unable to comment on the organization's past, but defended the group's independence today: "It's NSTA that decides what the content should be."</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><strong><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">'Win-win'</font></strong></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">With only 14 seniors, the class of 2016 came nowhere near filling a gymnasium in Salineville, Ohio—a town of 1,300 about 50 miles west of Pittsburgh. "In this region, there are phenomenal opportunities," said Rhonda Reda, delivering the keynote speech at the <a href="http://www.uticashaleschool.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Utica Shale Academy</a> graduation. "Go out there and make a difference."</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Named after the <a href="http://marcelluscoalition.org/pa-map/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">rock formation</a> that stretches from eastern Ohio to Canada, the tuition-free charter school founded in 2014 promises "real opportunity" outside of "traditional settings." Instead of hitting textbooks, students work on drilling certifications and intern for oil companies. Attendance is flexible: students must spend more than half their time on campus—an increase from a previous requirement of at least 15 hours weekly.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The academy rents space from two high schools. A third location for K-12 students was shuttered last June after just a year in operation. The academy's website prominently displays the logos of corporate partners like <a href="http://www.chk.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Chesapeake Energy</a>, whose executives meet with school administrators to help carve out the curriculum for the year.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">One of the academy's most prominent sponsors, the <a href="http://oogeep.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Ohio Oil and Gas Energy Education Program</a>—led by Reda—has stirred up criticism for its pro-drilling message. Like the Oklahoma energy resources board, the Ohio group is industry-funded, state-sanctioned and conducts free teacher workshops. In a meeting with state legislators in 2016, Reda said that 2,700 teachers statewide had attended the workshops since 1997.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Lisa Hoyos of <a href="http://www.climateparents.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Climate Parents</a>, an affiliate of the <a href="http://www.sierraclub.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Sierra Club</a> that successfully <a href="http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/1/8/radio-disney-s-partnershipwithgasindustryinohiohassomereeling.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">petitioned Radio Disney to sever ties</a> with Reda's group in 2014, criticized educational content that pushes petroleum's benefits but sidesteps its downsides. "They're basically indoctrinating children," she said of the Ohio program. "All the materials [the program is] putting out are about oil and gas, which are the chief culprits, along with coal, in causing climate change."</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Before founding the Ohio program in 1997, Reda handled public affairs for the state's Oil and Gas Association. She sits on the communications committee for the <a href="http://www.ipaa.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Independent Petroleum Association of America</a>, which created <a href="https://www.energyindepth.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Energy in Depth</a>—a website run by a <a href="http://www.fticonsulting.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">public-relations firm</a> that aggressively disputes industry criticism and news media reports, including <a href="http://energyindepth.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/EID-Eppy-Letter-with-Emails.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">investigative work</a> done by the Center for Public Integrity. Reda's program <a href="http://www.ipaa.org/2011/09/30/energy-in-depth-ohio-officially-launched/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">helped launch</a> Energy in Depth's <a href="https://www.energyindepth.org/ohio/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Ohio section</a> in 2011.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Reda declined to elaborate on her relationship with lobby groups, but wrote in an email that her organization "does not utilize any taxpayer dollars" and "does not lobby the legislature or take positions on regulatory or public policy." She added that her program "may elect on occasion to collaborate with other oil and gas groups, educational institutions and other experts on specific projects."</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Reda's group has helped develop lessons for the <a href="http://www.need.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">National Energy Education Development Project</a>, or NEED, a nonprofit that publishes thousands of pages of K-12 energy lessons online. A <a href="http://www.need.org/files/curriculum/guides/ExploringOilandGas.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">2015 NEED lesson</a> teaches students how to 'frack' a frozen layer cake using chocolate syrup and a syringe-like turkey injector—not unlike Ohio's demonstration using Twinkies.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Oil and gas companies are among NEED's most prominent backers. <a href="http://www.conocophillips.com/Pages/default.aspx" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">ConocoPhillips</a> has sponsored <a href="http://www.need.org/phillips66" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">NEED workshops</a> since 2008, exposing educators nationwide to packets like "<a href="http://www.need.org/files/curriculum/guides/OilGasandTheirEnergy.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Oil, Gas and their Energy</a>" and "<a href="http://www.need.org/files/curriculum/guides/ExploringOilandGas.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Exploring Oil and Gas</a>." A 2014 NEED guide tells of Sue Ann, who is a sticky pool of oil waiting to be freed, and Stacey, who wants to follow in her father's footsteps and become a blowout specialist on an offshore rig.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Executive Director Mary Spruill said NEED teams up with industry groups to train future workers, but the groups don't play a substantial role in developing content. "We don't send drafts to our partners," she said.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Like Reda, Spruill does not have an education or science background. Lessons from both their groups have been adapted by the "<a href="http://www.arkansasenergyrocks.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Arkansas Energy Rocks!</a>" website dedicated to teaching kids about the "thriving oil and natural gas industry." Lessons include, "<a href="http://www.arkansasenergyrocks.com/educators/lessonplans9-12/Rusert-Just-a-Little-Oil-Spill-Lesson-Plan.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Just a little oil spill</a>," which uses drops of vegetable oil in a pie plate filled with water to simulate an offshore oil spill, and "<a href="http://www.arkansasenergyrocks.com/educators/lessonplans9-12/Goodin-Persuasion-Power-Lesson-Plan.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Persuasion POWER!</a>" which highlights the legislative process with a congressional press release titled, "<a href="https://energycommerce.house.gov/news-center/press-releases/consumers-desperate-new-natural-gas-pipelines" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Consumers desperate for new natural gas pipelines</a>." It's unclear how many schools are using the materials.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The website is a project of the <a href="http://aipro.org/education/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Arkansas Energy Education Foundation</a>, a nonprofit arm of the <a href="http://aipro.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Arkansas Independent Producers & Royalty Owners</a>. The program's <a href="https://trademarks.justia.com/863/04/arkansas-energy-86304873.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">logo</a> and website are registered to the American Petroleum Institute. Listed as a contact for an <a href="http://www.har.com/arkansas-energy-rocks-annual-teacher-energy-education-workshop/event_E0-001-082460546-2" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">all-expenses-paid teachers' workshop</a> in 2015 promoting "Arkansas Energy Rocks!" was the personal email address of <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/paige-miller-apr-46713224/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Paige Miller</a>, an API public-affairs specialist based in Little Rock.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Spruill works closely with the Independent Petroleum Association of America, sitting on an advisory board for the lobby group's five "<a href="http://ipaa.org/education/academies/index.php" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Petroleum Academies</a>." IPAA, whose chief executive and lobbyist, <a href="http://www.ipaa.org/about/board-of-directors/barry-russell/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Barry Russell</a>, is co-chair of the advisory board, has billed the academies as a "<a href="http://ipaa.org/education/pdf/ipaa_edcenterbrochure.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">win-win</a>" for high schoolers and oil companies in Houston and Fort Worth.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Students are encouraged to put themselves in industry leaders' shoes by <a href="https://vimeo.com/117528427" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">competing</a> for lucrative leasing deals as fictional oil companies and delivering oral presentations on topics like "clearing misconceptions of the oil and gas industry."</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Despite the hard sell, some students are unsure of their <a href="http://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/economy/article/Houston-s-schools-adjust-to-an-oil-bust-after-8350400.php" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">prospects in the petroleum industry</a>. The ongoing oil-price slump has made jobs in the industry scarce and advancements in automation are expected to accelerate the trend.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Even in a state built on fossil fuels, other career options have grown more appealing. Having interviewed administrators at the academies, the Houston Chronicle reported last year that "students were gravitating more toward climate-friendly subjects like algae-based biofuel and super-efficient tiny houses."</font></p></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no img</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/oil-industry-influence-school-2442333774.html">https://www.ecowatch.com/oil-industry-influence-school-2442333774.html</a></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Merritt's first-graders at Jefferson Elementary School in Pryor, Oklahoma, were in for a treat. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, the students gathered in late November for story time with two special guests: <a href="http://www.okhouse.gov/District.aspx?District=8" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">state Rep. Tom Gann</a> and <a href="http://www.oksenate.gov/Senators/biographies/quinn_bio.aspx" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">state Sen. Marty Quinn</a>.</font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Dressed in suits, the Republican lawmakers read aloud from "<a href="http://oerbhomeroom.com/ebooks/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Petro Pete's Big Bad Dream</a>," a parable in which a Bob the Builder lookalike awakens to find his toothbrush, hardhat and even the tires on his bike missing. Abandoned by the school bus, Pete walks to Petroville Elementary in his pajamas.</font></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image" style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" /></p><div class="share-tab-img share-buttons share-trigger" style="display: inline-block; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; position: relative; overflow: hidden;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></font></font></font></font><div class="share-media-panel"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" /></font></font></font></font></font></font></div></div><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="add caption..." style="line-height: 2; display: block;"><font face="Times New Roman">State Rep. Tom Gann and State Sen. Marty Quinn read aloud to first graders at Jefferson Elementary School in Pryor, Oklahoma</font></small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="add photo credit..." style="display: block;"><font face="Times New Roman">Oklahoma Energy Resources Board</font></small></font></font></font></font></font><p><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" /></font></font></font></font></p><div id="AdThrive_Content_2_desktop" class="adthrive-ad adthrive-dynamic adthrive-content" data-google-query-id="CLHRhIu22dQCFUhifgodvqEKMw" style="margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); overflow-x: visible !important;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">"It sounds like you are missing all of your petroleum by-products today!" his teacher, Mrs. Rigwell, exclaims, extolling oil's benefits to Pete and fellow students like Sammy Shale. Before long, Pete decides that "having no petroleum is like a nightmare!"</font></font></font></font></font></font></div><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The tale is the latest in an illustrated series by the <a href="http://www.oerb.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Oklahoma Energy Resources Board</a>, a state agency funded by oil and gas producers. The board has spent upwards of $40 million over the past two decades on K-12 education with a pro-industry bent, including hundreds of pages of curricula, a speaker series and an afterschool program—all at no cost to educators.</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">A similar <a href="http://oogeep.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">program in Ohio</a> shows teachers how to "<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8hTBSC2Z1E" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">frack" Twinkies</a> using straws to pump for cream and advises on the curriculum for a <a href="http://www.uticashaleschool.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">charter school</a> that revolves around shale drilling. <a href="http://www.need.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">A national program</a> whose sponsors include BP and Shell claims it's too soon to tell if the earth is heating up, but "a little warming might be a good thing."</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image" style="margin: 10px 0px;" /><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Decades of documents reviewed by the <a href="https://www.publicintegrity.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Center for Public Integrity</a> reveal a tightly woven network of organizations that works in concert with the oil and gas industry to paint a rosy picture of fossil fuels in America's classrooms. Led by advertising and public-relations strategists, the groups have long plied the tools of their trade on impressionable children and teachers desperate for resources.</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Proponents of programs like the one in Oklahoma say they help the oil and gas industry replenish its aging workforce by stirring early interest in science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM. But some experts question the educational value and ethics of lessons touting an industry that plays a central role in <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">climate change</a> and <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/air-pollution" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">air pollution</a>.</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><a href="http://environment.yale.edu/profile/leiserowitz/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Anthony Leiserowitz</a>, director of the<a href="http://climatecommunication.yale.edu/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;"> </a><a href="http://climatecommunication.yale.edu/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Yale Program on Climate Change Communication</a>, likened industry-sponsored curricula that ignore climate science to advertising. "You're exploiting that trusted relationship between the student and the teacher," he said. Leiserowitz—whose research has focused on how culture, politics and psychology impact public perception of the environment—said fossil-fuel companies have a stake in perpetuating a message of oil dependency.</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>As early as the 1940s, the industry's largest and most powerful lobby group targeted K-12 schools as a key element of its fledgling marketing strategy. By the 1960s, the <a href="http://www.api.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">American Petroleum Institute</a> was looking to shake its reputation as a "monopoly</b> which reaped excessive profits" and set out to cultivate a network of "thought leaders" that included educators, journalists, politicians and even clergy, according to an organizational history copyrighted by API in 1990.</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The idea caught on. Hundreds of oil-and-gas-centric lesson plans are now available at the click of a mouse. The programs occupy a gray area between corporate sponsorship and promotion at a time when climate science has increasingly <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/27/us/politics/climate-change-denialists-in-charge.html?r=0" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">come under siege at the highest levels</a> of government. On June 1, <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">President Donald Trump</a>, flanked by <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">U.S. Environmental Protection Agency</a> administrator—and former Oklahoma attorney general—<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/scott-pruitt" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Scott Pruitt</a>, announced that the United States would withdraw from the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/paris-agreement" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Paris climate agreement</a>.</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">"Teachers are taking their cues from the political situation around them," said Glenn Branch of the <a href="https://ncse.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">National Center for Science Education</a>, a nonprofit that advocates for climate-change and evolution education. He pointed to a <a href="https://ncse.com/climate/first-nationwide-survey-climate-change-education" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">survey</a> that found teachers in Republican counties and states are less likely to teach the scientific consensus on global warming—regardless of the educator's politics. "Teachers live in local communities, they're sensitive to the needs and desires of the people paying their paychecks."</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Branch's group supports wide-scale adoption of <a href="http://www.nextgenscience.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Next Generation Science Standards</a>, a joint effort by states and educational organizations to revamp K-12 science that has met with political <a href="http://www.eenews.net/stories/1060036453" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">backlash</a> since the standards were published in 2013. Oklahoma is among a dozen states that have opted for watered-down versions, sometimes omitting provisions on evolution and the anthropogenic causes of global warming. Along with Colorado, Kansas and Montana, Oklahoma legislators have also championed bills requiring that educators teach "<a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/282542919_A_critical_political_ecology_of_consensus_On_Teaching_Both_Sides_of_climate_change_controversies?ev=prf_high" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">both sides</a>" of those scientific concepts....</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">A <a href="http://science.sciencemag.org/content/351/6274/664" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">2016 study</a> confirmed that America's youth receive mixed messages on climate change. Nearly a third of middle- and high-school science teachers nationwide have wrongly suggested global warming is naturally occurring. A quarter have spent as much time rebutting evidence of warming as they have presenting it.</font></font></font></font></font></p><div id="AdThrive_Content_1_desktop" class="adthrive-ad adthrive-dynamic adthrive-content" data-google-query-id="CJzssLm32dQCFUNXfgodZKwFTQ" style="margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); overflow-x: visible !important;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">
</font></font></font></font></font></div><p /><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><strong>Freddie Fuelless and Oliver Oilpatch</strong></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Schools and libraries across Oklahoma have received more than 9,000 complimentary copies of "Petro Pete's Big Bad Dream" since it was published last year. The story has been a hit with Jennifer Merritt's students, who <a href="http://oerbhomeroom.com/uploads/Contest%20Entry.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">won the storytelling visit</a> from lawmakers after submitting a photo to the energy resources board via Facebook. Posing on a jungle gym, the students clutched stuffed animals and footballs—their "favorite petroleum by-products."</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">"It's not some boring thing," Merritt said of the board's "<a href="http://oerbhomeroom.com/curricula/little-bits" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Little Bits</a>" curriculum for kindergarten through second grade, which features alliterative characters like Freddie Fuelless and Oliver Oilpatch. Without it, she said, "I probably wouldn't have taught first graders about energy."</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Merritt is among 14,000 Oklahoma teachers who have attended workshops on how to use what the board calls its "innovative, one-of-a-kind science and energy curriculum in their classrooms." Participants are reimbursed for supplies year-round and can register their classes for free museum field trips — so long as the exhibits <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3532953-2012-05-OERB-Board-Minutes.html#document/p2/a346360" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">highlight petroleum</a>.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">On a recent Saturday, a workshop was in session at <a href="http://www.cnpschools.org/ChoctawHS/CHS.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Choctaw High School</a>, east of Oklahoma City. The parking lot was bustling as teachers loaded their cars with heavy tubs, each stuffed with up to $1,200 worth of calculators, lab equipment and other materials. In classrooms, some teachers plotted oil-production trends while others watched bubbling brews simulating how the industry wrings oil from depleting fields.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">In an email, board <a href="http://www.oerb.com/about/board/18/danny-morgan" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Chairman Danny Morgan</a> wrote that the organization doesn't use public funds and "does not function like a typical agency." Under state law, half of its revenues from oil and gas producers are spent restoring abandoned oil wells. Morgan pointed to a board <a href="http://oerbhomeroom.com/well-site-safety/overview" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">safety campaign</a> aimed at preventing children from playing on dangerous pumpjacks that dot the state, writing, "if just one child is kept safe through the awareness this program created, it is well worth the effort."</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">While the board's curriculum enlightens students about the benefits of "black gold," their teachers are hard-pressed to find any information on climate change or other drawbacks of fossil fuels—even as Oklahoma struggles to curb <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-01/oil-rich-oklahoma-still-at-highest-risk-of-man-made-earthquakes" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">a slew of man-made earthquakes</a> tied to its <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/fracking/" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">fracking</a> boom. Morgan, an oil company executive and a former state legislator, declined to say why the board's materials fail to address global warming.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Cheerleading for the industry has been central to the energy resources board's mission from the start. Lawmakers <a href="https://www.oerb.com/uploads/oerb-statute.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">created the board in 1993</a> as a "privatized" state agency funded by a voluntary tax on local oil and gas producers to publicize the industry.<a href="https://www.kansasstrong.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;"> </a><a href="https://www.kansasstrong.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Kansas</a>,<a href="http://iprb.org/mission.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;"> </a><a href="http://iprb.org/mission.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Illinois</a> and<a href="http://oogeep.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;"> </a><a href="http://oogeep.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Ohio</a> followed suit with similar legislation.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">But Oklahoma remains the epicenter of oil-industry puffery in the classroom. The board's curricula are used in an estimated <a href="http://newsok.com/article/5510871" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">98 percent</a> of Oklahoma school districts and have been adopted in neighboring <a href="https://www.kansasstrong.com/educators/curricula-tools" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Kansas</a>. Records show that Oklahoma's energy resources board has pitched its programs and pro-industry ads to trade groups and <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3532806-2011-09-OERB-Board-Minutes.html#document/p1/a346371" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">legislators</a> in <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3532798-2011-01-OERB-Board-Minutes.html#document/p3/a346313" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Montana, Arkansas, North Dakota, Wyoming</a> and Texas. Similar petroleum boards in Kansas, Illinois and Ohio declined to fulfill records requests filed by the center.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Oklahoma's board appears to have taken cues from the <a href="http://www.api.org/about" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">American Petroleum Institute</a>—the country's leading oil and gas lobby group, representing more than 625 companies. The plot of "Big Bad Dream" bears uncanny similarities to API's 1996 educational film, <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20150811035415/http:/www.classroom-energy.org/oil_natural_gas/fuel_less/index.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;"><em>Fuel-less: you can't be cool without fuel</em></a>. Records show that the board's education director, who wrote "Big Bad Dream," has ordered hundreds of copies of <em>Fuel-less</em> to distribute locally—most recently in 2013.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">API's <a href="http://www.api.org/about/linda-rozett" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">vice president of communications</a> delivered a special presentation to the board in 2012 on marketing strategies. The same year, an <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/rolf-hanson-b4160416/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">API lobbyist</a> asked the board to host a fracking workshop on its behalf as part of the trade group's effort to reach out to legislators, regulators and other stakeholders nationwide. Morgan wrote that the board did not participate in the workshop because API "never followed up on the request." He added that the board itself doesn't engage in lobbying.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Copied on API's communications with the energy resources board was <a href="http://www.devonenergy.com/news/2008/Devon-Energy-Names-William-F-Whitsitt-Senior-Vice-President-Public-Affairs" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Bill Whitsitt</a>, a Devon Energy executive who helped draft letters for then-state attorney general Pruitt. In 2014, The New York Times reported on Pruitt's extensive industry ties—which included oil and gas companies, utilities and lobby groups.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Where the board draws the line between industry promotion and youth education is unclear. While it spent $3.5 million for K-12 efforts in 2016, <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3519040-OERB-Board-Minutes-2016-05.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">roughly the same amount</a> went to messaging it calls "public education." Its <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3536283-Brothers-Contract-FY-2012-2016.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">contract</a> with Oklahoma-based <a href="https://www.broco.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Brothers & Company</a>—which creates its <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/oerb07" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">pro-industry commercials</a> and some K-12 materials—forbids the advertising firm to perform work for other clients that "portrays the oil and natural gas exploration and production industry in an unfavorable light." Brothers & Company counts among its clients <a href="https://www.kansasstrong.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Kansas Strong</a>, an oil and gas marketing group similar to Oklahoma's; apparel company Under Armour; and handgun maker Remington.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Last spring, Brothers & Company rolled out an ad <a href="http://www.oerb.com/industry/impact/energy-to-amaze" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">campaign</a> highlighting petroleum's benefits and <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3519040-OERB-Board-Minutes-2016-05.html#document/p5/a346370" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">based</a> on Alex Epstein's <em>The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels</em>. Epstein is a <a href="http://www.eenews.net/stories/1060035542" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">libertarian writer</a> whose work is popular with <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-denier" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">climate-change deniers</a> and who falsely claims that rising carbon dioxide levels have yielded only "<a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2016/10/19/climate-change-presidential-debate-fossil-fuels-editorials-debates/92386846/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">mild and manageable" warming</a>.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">A Brothers & Company official wrote in an email that the firm's work for the energy resources board helps "citizens better understand domestic oil and natural gas production."</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">The firm also developed <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRdK0gPJIRc" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">videos</a> on Oklahoma's "seismicity issue" after the state was rattled by more than <a href="https://earthquakes.ok.gov/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">900 earthquakes</a> in 2015 and polls showed the matter was dampening <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3528501-2015-03-OERB-Board-Minutes-1.html#document/p3/a346342" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">the industry's "brand</a>." Energy resources board members insisted that no cause for the seismic uptick be cited in the videos. Records show that Morgan <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3528501-2015-03-OERB-Board-Minutes-1.html#document/p5/a346347" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">cautioned his colleagues</a> to be "careful not to state anything that someone might misconstrue and attempt to use in a court case." Soon afterward, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/22/us/oklahoma-acknowledges-wastewater-from-oil-and-gas-wells-as-major-cause-of-quakes.html" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">state officials acknowledged</a> that underground wells used for fracking waste likely were to blame....</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Carla Schaeperkoetter, the energy resources board's education director, is <a href="https://www.carlaschae.com/resume" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">the creator</a> of "Big Bad Dream" and "<a href="https://vimeo.com/106834573" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Lab Time with Leo</a>"—a video series featuring a bowtie-wearing scientist not unlike Bill Nye the Science Guy. Instead of exploring fundamentals like the solar system, Leo delves into the nuances of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaA2wzaKmNA" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">oil refining</a>, teaching kids as young as eight about "fractional distillation" and "residuals."</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Like her predecessor, Schaeperkoetter <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/carla-schaeperkoetter-a8b547a6/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">doesn't have</a> any teaching experience and isn't a state employee. Board staff—including Schaeperkoetter—are consultants hired by a private foundation affiliated with the <a href="http://www.oipa.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Oklahoma Independent Petroleum Association</a>. The state trade group is <a href="http://www.ipaa.org/about/cooperating-associations/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">listed as a partner</a> of the <a href="http://www.ipaa.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Independent Petroleum Association of America</a>, a lobbying organization that worked closely with API <a href="https://www.eenews.net/stories/1059979346" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">to roll back federal rules</a> on fracking.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Schaeperkoetter's name appears on curricula reassuring teachers that "companies are <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3534933-Little-Bits-Curriculum-Kindergarten-to-2nd-Grade.html#document/p5/a350260" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">spending more dollars</a> protecting the environment than drilling new wells." A jump-rope rhyme reads, "We need oil. We need gas. Where are the oil products in our class?" And a <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3537976-Core-Energy-Social-Studies.html#document/p139/a350296" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">high school guide</a> asks students to create 30-second commercials on how "new technologies to find oil and natural gas will help America be energy independent."</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://education.msu.edu/search/formview.aspx?email=andya%40msu.edu" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Charles W. Anderson</a>—a professor at Michigan State University who studies environmental literacy and develops curricula—said the board materials are upfront about their pro-industry agenda but only tell "half the story" by omitting global issues like climate change in favor of niche oil knowledge. "The children of Oklahoma are getting a raw deal—they are getting educationally ineffective materials teaching content that will be of little use to them if they want to leave the state," Anderson said.</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Students also are being sold short in more immediate ways: an increasing number of Oklahoma districts are <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/with-state-budget-in-crisis-many-oklahoma-schools-hold-classes-four-days-a-week/2017/05/27/24f73288-3cb8-11e7-8854-21f359183e8c_story.html?utm_term=.e90a2d7d610c" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">adopting four-day school weeks</a> amid budget cuts due partly to tax breaks for the petroleum industry. "The state government of Oklahoma, in its wisdom, has decided that oil and gas companies should have a whole lot of money and schools should have hardly any money," Anderson said. "That's a social decision that values oil and gas extraction over the public good of public schools."</font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 10px 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Oklahoma's <a href="http://sde.ok.gov/sde/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">State Department of Education</a> promotes energy board lessons online and in newsletters. Though the curricula are described by the board as having been developed in "a collaborative effort" with the state, the education department has "not reviewed, endorsed or had any oversight" over the materials in two decades, spokeswoman Anne Price said.</font></font></font></font></font></p><div id="AdThrive_Content_2_desktop" class="adthrive-ad adthrive-dynamic adthrive-content" data-google-query-id="CNCa6-O32dQCFZJ8YgodTwsHyA" style="margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px; text-align: center; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); overflow-x: visible !important;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" /></font></font></font></font><div id="google_ads_iframe_18190176/AdThrive_Content_2/58d2e52b44e6236dc5819ee2_0container" style="border: 0pt none; display: inline-block; width: 728px; height: 90px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4" /></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman">"We value curricula that align to our state standards and are at no cost to educators, but ultimately we encourage educators to investigate further to choose what is best for their classrooms," Price wrote in an email.</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Without explicit guidance, experts say, it's difficult for educators to assess which materials are appropriate—especially elementary-school teachers who don't have extensive science training. Historically, K-12 energy curricula have been scarce, leaving a window open for groups looking to mold young minds.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">"This provides an opportunity for anyone who has a particular point of view, whether it's an oil company or an environmental concern," said David Evans, executive director of the <a href="http://www.nsta.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">National Science Teachers Association</a>, which co-developed the Next Generation Science Standards. Both the association and the standards are supported by corporate money.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The standards specify which concepts students should grasp by grade level—like the greenhouse effects of gases like carbon dioxide and methane—but don't provide curricula, leaving educators to find or create lessons themselves. So far, the standards have been adopted by 18 states and the District of Columbia.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">When it comes to climate change, Evans urges teachers to stick to facts and avoid politics. "Science is about understanding the physical world that we live in," he said. "We wouldn't say, 'Why should people understand gravity?'"</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">But education is inherently political, said <a href="https://geog.okstate.edu/people/faculty" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Nicole Colston</a>, a researcher at Oklahoma State University who has <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016718515002201" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">studied</a> overlap between groups that push against evolution and climate change education. "It's this implied thing that you can't talk about climate change," she said of her interviews with Oklahoma teachers. "It's almost, like, impolite or uncomfortable."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Prominent Oklahomans like Pruitt and Republican <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/inhofe-declares-kids-brainwashed-after-granddaughter-asks-about-climate-change-484651" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">U.S. Sen. James Inhofe</a> are climate-science deniers, a fact not lost on the state's residents. Just 46 percent of adult Oklahomans believe global warming is caused mostly by human activities, below the national average of 53 percent, according to <a href="http://climatecommunication.yale.edu/visualizations-data/ycom-us-2016/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">2016 data</a> from the <a href="http://climatecommunication.yale.edu/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Yale Program on Climate Change Communication</a>.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">In 2014, <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/06/20/how-the-climate-change-debate-is-influencing-whats-taught-in-schools" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Oklahoma lawmakers tried but failed to block</a> the state board of education from adopting its version of Next Generation Science Standards. The same year, a state law was passed to give local school districts ultimate authority over curricula.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Merritt said she chose to use energy resources board materials because they were age-appropriate, factual and free. "It's just a way of life," she said of the curriculum's laser focus on petroleum. "We live in Oklahoma. There's a lot of oil."</font></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image" style="margin: 10px 0px;" /><p style="margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="add photo credit..." style="text-align: left; display: block;">
</small></font></p><p /><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">[fun vintage video and pix, mr science</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><strong><em>'The Magic Suitcase'</em></strong></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Smiling broadly, the host pulls item after item from two large drums. Plastic wrap, shingles, Lucite—all "modern day miracles" made possible by oil and petrochemicals. Three minutes into the muted-color film, the man in the tan suit and plaid tie pours Freon-12 from a pressurized canister.</font></p></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"></font></font></font></div><div><font size="4" /><p style="text-align: left;"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><b><font face="Times New Roman">=</font></b></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><b>https://www.desmogblog.com/2017/06/13/epa-chief-scott-pruitt-red-team-climate-science-eight-year-old-talking-point-heartland-institute</b></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">[<span class="dquo" open="Open" sans="Sans" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" style="margin-left: 0px;">“</span><span open="Open" sans="Sans" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px">We concluded we have to go after the science,” he said, adding Heartland’s “products and programs” would look to reach “all the way down to elementary school classrooms.” In recent weeks, </span><a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2017/06/10/us-senators-warn-education-department-heartland-institute-possibly-fraudulent-science-teachers-mailing" target="blank" open="Open" sans="Sans" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Heartland has been mailing a condensed version of its <span class="caps">NIPCC</span> report</a><span open="Open" sans="Sans" sans-serif="sans-serif" font-size="font-size" px="px"> to tens of thousands of school teachers across the country.]</span></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Like many of his Trump administration colleagues, Environmental Protection Agency (<span class="caps">EPA</span>) chief Scott Pruitt has never really been down with the whole climate science thing.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Pruitt has <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/mar/09/epa-scott-pruitt-carbon-dioxide-global-warming-climate-change" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">denied that carbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning is the key driver</a> of climate change, instead hedging his bets with an assortment of ifs, buts, and maybes.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Now, Pruitt is suggesting that what the American public really needs is more debate, more false equivalence, and more delay on policies to cut greenhouse gas emissions.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">In an interview on a Breitbart online radio segment, Pruitt has backed the idea of pitting climate science deniers up against actual climate scientists in what he called a “Red Team, Blue Team” debate.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Citing an idea from a column in the Wall Street Journal, Pruitt suggested “those scientists get into a room and ask, ‘What do we know? What don’t we know? What risk does it pose to health in the United States and the world, with respect to this issue of <span class="caps">CO2</span>?’”</font></font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" /></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman">According to Pruitt, this would be a “true, legitimate, peer reviewed, objective, transparent discussion about <span class="caps">CO2</span>” — a discussion “the American people deserve.”</font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">On the face of it, the suggestion might seem reasonable.  What’s wrong with a good old debate, right?</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Before we look at the people who have been pushing this “red team” idea, it’s worth clarifying something.</font></font></font></p><h3 style="text-align: left; line-height: 1.28205em; margin-top: 1.28205em; margin-bottom: 1.28205em;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">The Real Red Team</font></font></font></h3><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">A version of this “red team” process already exists, and it’s called scientific peer review. </font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Scientists do research, write-up their findings, and submit them to a journal. The journal sends the paper to other qualified scientists who critique the work, sometimes mercilessly. That work may get published; at which point other scientists can build on the findings or find ways to reject them.</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">This is partly why, after the publication of tens of thousands of research papers going back a century or more, science academies and institutions around the world agree that global warming is real, is caused by humans, and is a serious problem.</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">So in the blue corner, you have all the credible and reasonable science, and in the red corner, you have something else.</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">In reality, the climate science denial industry has been touting itself as a viable “red team” for more than a decade. </font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">MMFA</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">MMFA</font></font></p><h3 style="text-align: left; line-height: 1.28205em; margin-top: 1.28205em; margin-bottom: 1.28205em;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">Heartland Institute as the Red Team</font></font></h3><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">But before all this, one of America’s most notorious groups pushing climate science denial — the <a href="http://desmogblog.com/heartland-institute" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Heartland Institute</a> — was touting the “red team” concept.</font></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">IPCC</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">NIPCC</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">In Heartland’s first <span class="caps">NIPCC</span> report in 2009, the group framed their critique as an innocent and disinterested “Team B.”</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><span class="dquo" style="margin-left: 0px;">“</span>It is a time-honored tradition in science to set up a ‘Team B’ which examines the same original evidence but may reach a different conclusion,” the preface mused.</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">In a follow-up 2011 “interim report,” Heartland again touted its credentials as a “Team B,” explaining its formative roots at a meeting in Milan in 2003 organized by <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/s-fred-singer" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Fred Singer</a> and his <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/science-and-environmental-policy-project" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Science and Environmental Policy Project</a> (<span class="caps">SEPP</span>).</font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">But in the following 2013 report — Climate Change Reconsidered <span class="caps">II</span> — the language had been tweaked. What was “Team B” was now a “Red Team.”</font></font></p><p style="margin: 1em 0px;" /><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"><img alt="" src="https://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/nipcc%20grab3.jpg" style="border: 2px solid; max-width: 100%; height: 41px; width: 332px;" /></font></div><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" /></font><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><em>Heartland's 2013 <span class="caps">NIPCC</span> report used the term “red team.”</em></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><p /><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Long-serving Heartland scientist and <span class="caps">NIPCC</span> coordinator, the <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2016/01/22/veteran-climate-science-denialist-bob-carter-dies-heart-attack" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">late Australian Dr. Bob Carter</a>, wrote about the “red team” in a September 2013 column for the Rupert Murdoch–owned tabloid, the <a href="http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/report-gives-the-truth-about-climate-at-last/news-story/0948f8db78dd1fc628543efcd4657a3f" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Daily Telegraph, based in Sydney</a>.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Carter wrote: “In classic Green Team: Red Team tactical management style, the <span class="caps">NIPCC</span> has the role of providing an alternative Red Team view of the science of global warming, acting as a sort of 'defense counsel' to verify and counter the arguments mounted for climate alarm by the <span class="caps">IPCC</span>'s Green Team prosecution.”</font></p><h3 style="text-align: left; line-height: 1.28205em; margin-top: 1.28205em; margin-bottom: 1.28205em;"><font face="Times New Roman">China Crisis</font></h3><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">NIPCC</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Bast <a href="https://youtu.be/JZj0L9TEuv0" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">outlined how his institute had identified climate change in the early 90s</a> as “the mother of all environmental scare stories” but then suggested the science was actually a sinister cover for something else entirely.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><b style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><span class="dquo" style="margin-left: 0px;">“</span>Groups on the left understand if we can control energy, you can control human beings, and that’s what it was all about,” claimed Bast.</b></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Environmentalists were trying to “shut down the engines of the world,” Bast said, without saying why they might want to do any of those things.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">“</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">“</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">NIPCC</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">NIPCC</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">After a round of applause, Bast said he hoped “other academies of science,” including Australia, would follow suit, implying the Chinese Academy of Sciences had somehow endorsed the report.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">At the time of the Chinese version being released, Bast had issued a press release claiming a “historic moment” for global warming science. He sent Heartland staff, including Carter, to Beijing for a press opportunity.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">But as <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2013/06/18/heartland-institute-keystone-cops-climate-science-denial-strike-again" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">DeSmog reported</a>, the <b><span class="caps">CAS</span> issued a statement saying:  “The claim of the Heartland Institute about <span class="caps">CAS</span>’ endorsement of its report is completely false</b>.”</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Bast was <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20150107084434/http://news.heartland.org/newspaper-article/2013/06/14/heartland-institute-statement-chinese-edition-climate-change-reconsider" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">forced to apologize</a> and had to pull the publication from his website and withdraw the original press release. But once Carter was out of China, <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20150107032744/http://heartland.org/press-releases/2013/06/11/chinese-academy-sciences-publishes-heartland-institute-research-skeptical-" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Bast re-issued the press release and rejected the criticisms of the <span class="caps">CAS</span></a>.</b></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Oddly, none of this detail made its way into Bast’s opening remarks.</font></p><h3 style="text-align: left; line-height: 1.28205em; margin-top: 1.28205em; margin-bottom: 1.28205em;"><font face="Times New Roman">Fake Discussion</font></h3></div><div><p class="title" align="left"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><b>=</b></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Four Democratic senators are sharply criticizing a conservative think tank’s efforts to bring climate change skepticism into the nation’s public schools as “industry funded” and “possibly fraudulent” and demanding to know whether federal education officials have been in contact with the group.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">The Heartland Institute has been sending books, DVDs and pamphlets to science teachers across the country promoting its stance that climate change is caused by natural phenomena rather than human activities — a view <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0270467616634958" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box;">rejected</span></a><span style="box-sizing: border-box;"> by nearly all climate scientists. Heartland’s campaign to influence how climate science is taught in public schools was first reported by FRONTLINE and The GroundTruth Project </span><a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/climate-change-skeptic-group-seeks-to-influence-200000-teachers/" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;"><span style="box-sizing: border-box;">in March</span></a><span style="box-sizing: border-box;">.</span></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The Illinois-based non-profit vows to continue its efforts, saying it has already sent more than 300,000 packages to K-12 and college-level science teachers since the launch of the campaign earlier this year. Mailings have wrapped up for the summer break, according to Heartland spokesman Jim Lakely. He added, however, “This is not the end of Heartland’s efforts to bring balance to the climate debate in our schools, but just the beginning.”</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">In <a href="https://www.whitehouse.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/2017-06-07%20Heartland%20Letter%20-%20DeVos.pdf" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">a letter</a> sent to Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Wednesday, Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) — all of whom have been outspoken on climate change issues — described the campaign as an effort “to disseminate fossil-fuel industry talking points as curriculum for science teachers.”</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The senators asked DeVos whether any Education Department officials have had contact with individuals associated with the Heartland Institute “on climate, science, or science education issues,” and whether any informational resources put out by the department have been created in collaboration with Heartland.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">The senators also asked DeVos whether she was aware of any discussions between the White House staff and Heartland. In March, the group’s president and CEO, Joseph Bast, told FRONTLINE and GroundTruth<b>, “We’re getting a lot of requests for expert opinion from the White House … That’s very new.”</b></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Heartland was founded in 1984 and has a history of promoting causes that align with the interests of industry. In the 1990s, for instance, the organization lobbied against smoking bans, for which it was <a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/220221575/Joe-Bast-s-bottom-line" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">rewarded</a>with donations from tobacco company Philip Morris. Today, the group promotes a bevy of libertarian and conservative causes, <a href="https://www.heartland.org/Center-Education/index.html" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">including one</a>DeVos has spent <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/23/us/politics/betsy-devos-trumps-education-pick-has-steered-money-from-public-schools.html?r=0" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">years</a> advocating for: The school choice movement, which would allow students to spend public dollars to attend private and religious schools.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">But Heartland is perhaps best known for its position as a leader in the movement to reject the scientific consensus on global warming. A<b>mong the group’s arguments is that curbing greenhouse gases would damage the economy — the primary reason <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/06/01/statement-president-trump-paris-climate-accord" target="blank" style="background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">given by President Donald Trump </a>last week for pulling out of the Paris climate accord.</b></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">DeVos has, until recently, been relatively quiet on her personal view about climate change. During her nomination process in January, she was asked by Whitehouse whether she believed that humans cause climate change. DeVos answered that because the Education Department has no jurisdiction over climate change, “I would respectfully defer to my colleagues in other agencies” on the issue, and noted that the department “is prohibited from dictating curricula in our nation’s schools.” States and school districts, rather than the Education Department, direct curricula and science standards.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">However, last week DeVos issued <a href="https://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/secretary-devos-releases-statement-president-trumps-decision-withdraw-us-paris-climate-accord" style="background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">a statement</a> praising President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accord. </span>“The announcement made today by the President is one more example of his commitment to rolling back the unrealistic and overreaching regulatory actions by the previous Administration,” the statement read.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">It was that statement that prompted Whitehouse and his colleagues to write the letter, he said. “It raises at least a suggestion that there may be more mischief going on between the fossil fuel industry and its denial front groups and the administration through Secretary DeVos,” the senator said in an interview.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">DeVos did not immediately respond to a request for comment.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Heartland declined to comment on whether anyone at the organization has corresponded or met with staff at the Education Department, but in a written statement Bast said that his organization stands by the materials it has sent to teachers, and will continue to send out copies as it sees fit. Bast said the senators’ letter consisted of “purely partisan rhetoric apparently aimed at undermining the presidency of Donald Trump,” and said that Whitehouse is guilty of the very thing Heartland has frequently been accused of: bringing “politics into high school classrooms.”</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The senators’ letter isn’t the first Democratic condemnation of the mailing campaign: In April, three ranking Democrats in the House <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/democrats-condemn-climate-change-skeptics-for-targeting-teachers/" style="background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">publicly urged Heartland</a> to stop the mailing campaign</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Whitehouse also sent letters to a dozen scientific and educational organizations to “alert” them to “factually inaccurate and scientifically unsound materials on climate change.” He said he worries that the Heartland materials will successfully sway some teachers’ opinions of climate change.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em auto; width: 660px;"><font face="Times New Roman">“It takes a bit of sincere effort to do the research and find how fraudulent many of their assertions are, and that’s an effort that busy teachers may not undertake,” he said. “So it leaves at least a passing impression in an innocent teacher’s mind that there may actually be something to this.”</font></p><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">=</font></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">
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</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">http://www.alternet.org/environment/heartland-institute-peddling-misinformation-teachers-about-climate-change-again</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">...What if the information the student shared was not based on the best available evidence? Misinformation would begin to spread more widely. If corrected, the student might distrust the teacher who may have not known the source material was compromised.</font></div><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font face="Times New Roman">This scenario is not fiction. It has happened and may still be occurring in some U.S. schools. Anyone concerned about this can learn more with an update forthcoming from those who keep track—the National Center for Science Education (<a href="https://ncse.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">NCSE</a>).</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font face="Times New Roman">According to the NCSE, during <a href="https://ncse.com/files/nipcc.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">October 2013 educators received a packet chock full of misinformation</a> about climate change. The report includes an abbreviation that looked similar to a highly respected source—the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)—for international climate assessments.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font face="Times New Roman">It has happened again (starting in March 2017). Many teachers found a packet in their mailbox with a report from the same group that spread the misinformation back in October 2013. This report has a “second edition” gold highlight with a cover image of water flowing over a dam and a misleading title....</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><em>Not Science” stamp on top of the report cover mailed to teachers during spring 2017. The report misrepresents the fact that nearly all climate scientists agree about human-driven climate change.</em></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman">The report runs counter to the agreement among scientists who publish on climate change in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. More than <a href="http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/8/2/024024/meta;jsessionid=CA704F6EEFD42EE913AC9AFC639A0927.c5.iopscience.cld.iop.org" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">97% of scientists agree that climate change is caused by human activities</a></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font face="Times New Roman">The Heartland Institute is infamous for its rejection of climate science and <a href="https://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/04/a-new-tactic-for-climate-skeptics/?r=0" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">unsavory tactics</a>. According to a reported statement by the CEO of Heartland Institute, <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/climate-change-skeptic-group-seeks-to-influence-200000-teachers/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none;">they plan to keep sending out copies to educators over the weeks ahead</a>.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font face="Times New Roman">If you see any student or teacher with this report or DVD please let <a href="https://ncse.com/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">NCSE</a> know about it and share what you have learned to help stop the spread.</font></p><div wibbitz="embed-main-player"><div class="bio-new body_environment" style="width: 630px; line-height: 22px; height: auto; border-top: 3px solid rgb(223, 223, 218); clear: both;"><div class="author-bio"><p style="text-align: left; margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font face="Times New Roman">Brenda Ekwurzel is a senior climate scientist and the director of climate science at the Union of Concerned Scientists.</font></p></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">ref 2008 api</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">
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</font></div><div><table><tbody><tr><td width="640"><hr /><font face="Times New Roman"><b>The material below contains a memo by the API from April 1998.</b></font><hr /><h4 align="center"><font face="Times New Roman">Memo</font></h4><h4><font face="Times New Roman">Joe Walker</font></h4><h4><font face="Times New Roman">To: Global Climate Science Team
Cc: Michelle Ross; Susan Moya
Subject: Draft Global Climate Science Communications plan
</font></h4><p><font face="Times New Roman"><b>As promised, attached is the draft Global Climate Science Communications Plan that we developed during our workshop Last Friday. Thanks especially to those of you who participated in the workshop, and In particular to John Adams for his very helpful thoughts following up our meeting, and Alan Caudill for turning around the notes from our workshop so quickly.</b></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><b>Please review the pan and get back to me with your comments as soon as possible.</b></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><b>As those of you who were at the workshop know, we have scheduled a follow - up team meeting to review the plan in person on Friday, April 17, form 1 to 3 p.m. at the API headquarters. After that, we hope to have a "plan champion" help us move it forward to potential funding sources, perhaps starting with the global climate "Coordinating Council." That will be an item for discussion on April 17.</b></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><b>Again, thanks for your hard work on this project. Please e-mail me, call or fax me with your comments. Thanks.</b></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><b>Regards,
Joe Walker</b></font></p><hr /><font face="Times New Roman" /><p align="center"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><b>Global Climate Science Communications</b></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></p><h3 align="center">Action Plan</h3><h4>Situation Analysis</h4><dl><dt><b>In<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"> December 1997, the Clinton Administration agreed in Kyoto, Japan, to a treaty to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to prevent what it purports to be changes in the global climate caused by the continuing release of such emissions. The so-called green house gases have many sources. For example, water vapor is a greenhouse gas. But the Clinton Administration's action, if eventually approved by the U.S. Senate, will mainly affect emissions from fossil fuel (gasoline, coal, natural gas, etc.) combustion.</span></b></dt></dl><dl><p><b>As the climate change debate has evolved, those who oppose action have argued mainly that signing such a treaty will place the U.S. at a competitive disadvantage with most other nations, and will be extremely expensive to implement. Much of the cost will be borne by American consumers who will pay higher prices for most energy and transportation.</b></p><p><b>The climate change theory being advanced by the treaty supporters is based primarily on forecasting models with a very high degree of uncertainty. In fact, its not known for sure whether (a) climate change actually is occurring, or (b) if it is, whether humans really have any influence on it.</b></p><p><b>Despite these weaknesses in scientific understanding, those who oppose the treaty have done little to build a case against precipitous action on climate change based on the scientific uncertainty. As a result, The Clinton Administration and environmental groups essentially have had the field to themselves. They have conducted an effective public relations program to convince the American public that the climate is changing, we humans are at fault, and we must do something about it before calamity strikes.</b></p><p><b>The<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"> environmental groups know they have been successful. Commenting after the Kyoto negotiations about recent media coverage of climate change, Tom Wathen, executive vice president of the National Environmental Trust, wrote:</span></b></p><p><b><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">"...As important as the extent of the coverage was the tone and tenor of it. In a change from just six months ago, most media stories no longer presented global warming as just a theory over which reasonable scientists could differ</span>. Most stories described predictions of global warming as the position of the overwhelming number of mainstream scientists. That the environmental community had, to a great extent, settled the scientific issue with the U.S. media is the other great success that began perhaps several months earlier but became apparent during Kyoto."</b></p><p><b>Because the science underpinning the global climate change theory has not been challenged effectively in the media or through other vehicles reaching the American public, there is widespread ignorance, which works in favor of the Kyoto treaty and against the best interests of the United States. Indeed, the public has been highly receptive to the Clinton Administrations plans. There has been little, if any, public resistance or pressure applied to Congress to reject the treaty, except by those "inside the Beltway" with vested interests.</b></p><p><b>Moreover, from the political viewpoint, it is difficult for the United States to oppose the treaty solely on economic grounds, valid as the economic issues are. It makes it too easy for others to portray the United States as putting preservation of its own lifestyle above the greater concerns of mankind. This argument, in turn, forces our negotiators to make concessions that have not been well thought through, and in the end may do far more harm than good. This is the process that unfolded at Kyoto, and is very likely to be repeated in Buenos Aires in November 1998.</b></p><p><b>The advocates of global warming have been successful on the basis of skillfully misrepresenting the science and the extent of agreement on the science, while industry and its partners ceded the science and fought on the economic issues. Yet if we can show that science does not support the Kyoto treaty - which most true climate scientists believe to be the case - this puts the United States in a stronger moral position and frees its negotiators from the need to make concessions as a defense against perceived selfish economic concerns.</b></p><p><b>Upon this tableau<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">, the Global Climate Science Communications Team (GCSCT) developed an action plan to inform the American public that science does not support the precipitous actions Kyoto would dictate,</span> thereby providing a climate for the right policy decisions to be made. The team considered results from a new public opinion survey in developing the plan.</b></p><p><b>Charlton Research's survey of 1,100 "informed Americans" suggests that while Americans currently perceive climate change to be a great threat, public opinion is open enough to change on climate science. When informed that "some scientists believe there is not enough evidence to suggest that [what is called global climate change] is a long-term change due to human behavior and activities," 58 percent of those surveyed said they were more likely to oppose the Kyoto treaty. Moreover, half the respondents harbored doubts about climate science.</b></p><p><b>GCSCT<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"> members who contributed to the development of the plan are A. John Adams, John Adams Associates; Candace Crandall, Science and Environmental Policy Project; David Rothbard, Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow; Jeffrey Salmon, The Marshall Institute; Lee Garrigan, environmental issues Council; Lynn Bouchey and Myron Ebell, Frontiers of Freedom; Peter Cleary, Americans for Tax Reform; Randy Randol, Exxon Corp.; Robert Gehri, The Southern Company; Sharon Kneiss, Chevron Corp; Steve Milloy, The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition; and Joseph Walker, American Petroleum Institute.</span></b></p><p><b>The action plan is detailed on the following pages.</b></p><hr /><h4 align="center">Global Climate Science Communications</h4><h3 align="center">Action Plan</h3><h4>Project Goal</h4><dt><b>A majority of the American public, including industry leadership, recognizes that significant uncertainties exist in climate science, and therefore raises questions among those (e.g. Congress) who chart the future U.S. course on global climate change.</b></dt></dl><dl><p><b>Progress will be measured toward the goal. A measurement of the public's perspective on climate science will be taken before the plan is launched, and the same measurement will be taken at one or more as-yet-to-be-determined intervals as the plan is implemented,</b></p><h3 align="center"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Victory Will Be Achieved When</span></h3><ul><li><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Average citizens "understand" (recognize) uncertainties in climate science; recognition of uncertainties becomes part of the "conventional wisdom"</b></span></li><li><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Media "understands" (recognizes) uncertainties in climate science</b></span></li><li><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Media coverage reflects balance on climate science and recognition of the validity of viewpoints that challenge the current "conventional wisdom"</b></span></li><li><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Industry senior leadership understands uncertainties in climate science, making them stronger ambassadors to those who shape climate policy</b></span></li><li><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Those promoting the Kyoto treaty on the basis of extent science appears to be out of touch with reality.</b></span></li></ul><h3 align="center">Current Reality</h3><p><b>Unless "climate change" becomes a non-issue, meaning that the Kyoto proposal is defeated and there are no further initiatives to thwart the threat of climate change, there may be no moment when we can declare victory for our efforts. It will be necessary to establish measurements for the science effort to track progress toward achieving the goal and strategic success.</b></p><h3 align="center">Strategies and Tactics</h3><p><b>I. National Media Relations Program: Develop and implement a national media relations program to inform the media about uncertainties in climate science; to generate national, regional and local media coverage on the scientific uncertainties, and thereby educate and inform the public, stimulating them to raise questions with policy makers.</b></p><p><b>Tactics: These tactics will be undertaken between now and the next climate meeting in Buenos Aires/Argentina, in November 1998, and will be continued thereafter, as appropriate. Activities will be launched as soon as the plan is approved, funding obtained, and the necessary resources (e.g., public relations counsel) arranged and deployed. In all cases, tactical implementation will be fully integrated with other elements of this action plan, most especially Strategy II (National Climate Science Data Center).</b></p><p><b>Identify, recruit and train a team of five independent scientists to participate in media outreach. These will be individuals who do not have a long history of visibility and/or participation in the climate change debate. Rather, this team will consist of new faces who will add their voices to those recognized scientists who already are vocal.</b></p></dl><ul><li><b>Develop a global climate science information kit for media including peer-reviewed papers that undercut the "conventional wisdom"on climate science. This kit also will include understandable communications, including simple fact sheets that present scientific uncertainties in language that the media and public can understand.</b></li><li><b>Conduct briefings by media-trained scientists for science writers in the top 20 media markets, using the information kits. Distribute the information kits to daily newspapers nationwide with offer of scientists to brief reporters at each paper. Develop, disseminate radio news releases featuring scientists nationwide, and offer scientists to appear on radio talk shows across the country.</b></li><li><b>Produce, distribute a steady stream of climate science information via facsimile and e-mail to science writers around the country.</b></li><li><b>Produce, distribute via syndicate and directly to newspapers nationwide a steady stream of op-ed columns and letters to the editor authored by scientists.</b></li><li><b>Convince one of the major news national TV journalists (e.g., John Stossel ) to produce a report examining the scientific underpinnings of the Kyoto treaty.</b></li><li><b>Organize, promote and conduct through grassroots organizations a series of campus/community workshops/debates on climate science in 10 most important states during the period mid-August through October, 1998.</b></li><li><b>Consider advertising the scientific uncertainties in select markets to support national, regional and local (e.g., workshops / debates), as appropriate.</b></li></ul><dl><dd><b> </b></dd><p align="center"><b>National Media Program Budget -- $600,000 plus paid advertising</b></p><p><b>II. Global Climate Science Information Source: Develop and implement a program to inject credible science and scientific accountability into the global climate debate, thereby raising questions about and undercutting the "prevailing scientific wisdom." The strategy will have the added benefit of providing a platform for credible, constructive criticism of the opposition's position on the science.</b></p><p><b>Tactics: As with the National Media Relations Program, these activities will be undertaken between now and the next climate meeting in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in November 1998, and will continue thereafter. Initiatives will be launched as soon as the plan is approved, funding obtained, and the necessary resources arranged and deployed.</b></p></dl><ul><li><b>Establish a Global Climate Science Data Center. The GCSDC will be established in Washington as a non-profit educational foundation with an advisory board of respected climate scientists. It will be staffed initially with professionals on loan from various companies and associations with a major interest in the climate issue. These executives will bring with them knowledge and experience in the following areas.</b></li></ul><blockquote><ul><li><b>Overall history of climate research and the IPCC process;</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Congressional relations and knowledge of where individual Senators stand on the climate issue;</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Knowledge of key climate scientists and where they stand;</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Ability to identify and recruit as many as 20 respected climate scientists to serve on the science advisory board;</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Knowledge and expertise in media relations and with established relationships with science and energy writers, columnists and editorial writers;</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Expertise in grassroots organization; and</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Campaign organization and administration.</b></li></ul></blockquote><p><b>The GCSDC will be led by dynamic senior executive with a major personal commitment to the goals of the campaign and easy access to business leaders at the CEO level. The Center will be run on a day-to-day basis by an executive director with responsibility for ensuring targets are met. The Center will be funded at a level that will permit it to succeed, including funding for research contracts that may be deemed appropriate to fill gaps in climate science (e.g., a complete scientific critique of the IPCC research and its conclusions).</b></p><ul><li><b>The GCSDC will become a one-stop resource on climate science for members of Congress, the media, industry and all others concerned. It will be in constant contact with the best climate scientists and ensure that their findings and views receive appropriate attention. It will provide them with the logistical and moral support they have been lacking. In short, it will be a sound scientific alternative to the IPCC. Its functions will include:</b></li></ul><blockquote><ul><li><b>Providing as an easily accessible database (including a website) of all mainstream climate science information.</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Identifying and establishing cooperative relationships with all major scientists whose research in this field supports our position.</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Establishing cooperative relationships with other mainstream scientific organizations (e.g., meteorologists, geophysicists) to bring their perspectives to bear on the debate, as appropriate.</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Developing opportunities to maximize the impact of scientific views consistent with ours with Congress, the media and other key audiences.</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Monitoring and serving as and early warning system for scientific developments with the potential to impact on the climate science debate, pro and con.</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Responding to claims from the scientific alarmists and media.</b></li></ul></blockquote><blockquote><ul><li><b>Providing grants for advocacy on climate science, as deemed appropriate.</b></li></ul></blockquote><dl><p align="center"><b>Global Climate Science Data Center Budget --- $5,000,000 (Spread over two years minimum)</b></p><p><b>III. National Direct Outreach and Education: Develop and implement a direct outreach program to inform and educate members of Congress, state officials, industry leadership, and school teachers/students about uncertainties in climate science. This strategy will enable Congress, state officials and industry leaders will be able to raise such serious questions about the Kyoto treaty's scientific underpinnings that American policy-makers not only will refuse to endorse it, they will seek to prevent progress toward implementation at the Buenos Aires meeting in November or through other ways. Informing teachers/students about uncertainties in climate science will begin to erect a barrier against further efforts to impose Kyoto-like measures in the future.</b></p><p><b>Tactics: Informing and educating members of Congress, state officials and industry leaders will be undertaken as soon as the plan is approved, funding is obtained, and the necessary resources are arrayed and will continue through Buenos Aires and for the foreseeable future. The teachers/students outreach program will be developed and launched in early 1999. In all cases, tactical implementation will be fully integrated with other elements of this action plan.</b></p></dl><ul><li><b>Develop and conduct through the Global Climate Science Data Center science briefings for Congress, governors, state legislators, and industry leaders by August 1998.</b></li></ul><ul><li><b>Develop information kits on climate science targeted specifically at the needs of government officials and industry leaders, to be used in conjunction with and separately from the in-person briefings to further disseminate information on climate science uncertainties and thereby arm these influentials to raise serious questions on the science issue.</b></li></ul><ul><li><b><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Organize under the GCSDC a "Science Education Task Group" that will serve as the point of outreach to the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) and other influential science education organizations.</span> Work with NSTA to develop school materials that present a credible, balanced picture of climate science for use in classrooms nationwide.</b></li></ul><ul><li><b>Distribute educational materials directly to schools and through grassroots organizations of climate science partners (companies, organizations that participate in this effort).</b></li></ul><dl><p align="center"><b>National Direct Outreach Program Budget ---- $300,000</b></p><p><b>IV. Funding/Fund Allocation: Develop and implement program to obtain funding, and to allocate funds to ensure that the program is carried out effectively.</b></p><p><b>Tactics: This strategy will be implemented as soon as we have the go-ahead to proceed.</b></p></dl><ul><li><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Potential funding sources were identified as American Petroleum Institute (API) and its members; Business Round Table (BRT) and its members, Edison Electric Institute (EEI) and its members; Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA) and its members; and the National Mining Association (NMA) and its members.</b></span></li></ul><ul><li><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Potential fund allocators were identified as the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), Competitive Enterprise Institute , Frontiers of Freedom and The Marshall Institute.</b></span></li></ul><dl><p align="center"><b>Total Funds Required to Implement Program through November 1998 ---- $2,000,000 ( A significant portion of funding for the GCSDC will be deferred until 1999 and beyond)</b></p><h3 align="center">Measurements</h3><dt><b>Various metrics</b> will be used to track progress. These measurements will have to be determined in fleshing out the action plan and may include:</dt></dl><ul><li>Baseline public / government official opinion surveys and periodic follow-up surveys on the percentage of Americans and government officials who recognize significant uncertainties in climate science.</li><li>Tracking the percent of media articles that raise questions about climate science.</li><li>Number of Members of Congress exposed to our materials on climate science.</li><li>Number of communications on climate science received by Members of Congress from their constituents.</li><li>Number of radio talk show appearances by scientists questioning the "prevailing wisdom" on climate science.</li><li>Number of school teachers / students reached with our information on climate science.</li><li>Number of science writers briefed and who report upon climate science uncertainties.</li><li>Total audience exposed to newspaper, radio, television coverage of science uncertainties.</li></ul><hr style="font-weight: bold;" /></td></tr></tbody></table></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/climate-change-skeptic-group-seeks-to-influence-200000-teachers/</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Twenty-five thousand science teachers opened their mailboxes this month and found a package from the Heartland Institute, a libertarian think tank that rejects the scientific consensus on climate change.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">It contained the organization’s <a href="https://www.heartland.org/template-assets/documents/publications/12-04-15_why_scientists_disagree.pdf" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">book</a> “Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming,” as well as a DVD rejecting the human role in climate change and arguing instead that rising temperatures have been caused primarily by natural phenomena. The material will be sent to an additional 25,000 teachers every two weeks until every public-school science teacher in the nation has a copy, Heartland president and CEO Joseph Bast said in an interview last week. If so, the campaign would reach <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d15/tables/dt15_209.20.asp?current=yes" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">more than</a> 200,000 K-12 science teachers.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Accompanying the materials is <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3526415-Heartland-Institute-letter-to-educators.html" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">a cover letter</a> from Lennie Jarratt, project manager of Heartland’s Center for Transforming Education. He asks teachers to “consider the possibility” that the science is not settled. “If that’s the case, then students would be better served by letting them know a vibrant debate is taking place among scientists,” he writes. The letter also points teachers to an online guide to using the DVD in their classrooms.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The Heartland initiative dismisses <a href="http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/8/2/024024/meta" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">multiple</a> <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0270467616634958" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">studies</a> showing scientists are in near unanimous agreement that humans are changing the climate. Even if human activity is contributing to climate change, the book argues, it “would probably not be harmful, because many areas of the world would benefit from or adjust to climate change.”</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The campaign elicited immediate derision from the National Center for Science Education (NCSE), a nonprofit in Oakland, California that monitors climate change education in classrooms.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">“It’s not science, but it’s dressed up to look like science,” said NCSE executive director Ann Reid. “It’s clearly intended to confuse teachers.”</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">It’s too early to know how the materials will be used in schools around the country. There aren’t uniform standards for teaching climate change, and the subject has caused <a href="http://www.wvgazettemail.com/article/20160226/GZ01/160229560" style="background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">rigorous debate</a> in some states. Even when it is taught, Reid says, “what goes on behind the classroom door is really up to the teacher.”</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The campaign comes at a time when Heartland’s influence on national climate policy is at an apex. Myron Ebell, a leading climate change skeptic and a longtime <a href="https://www.heartland.org/about-us/who-we-are/myron-ebell" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">ally</a> of the Heartland Institute, <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/meet-myron-ebell-the-climate-contrarian-leading-trumps-epa-transition/" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">ran</a> President Donald Trump’s transition efforts for the Environmental Protection Agency. That process led to the appointment of<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/03/09/on-climate-change-scott-pruitt-contradicts-the-epas-own-website/?utm_term=.401721d03e98" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;"> climate change skeptic</a> Scott Pruitt as administrator of the EPA. Pruitt, a former Oklahoma attorney general, has publicly questioned the scientific consensus around climate change, and has brought in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/07/us/politics/scott-pruitt-environmental-protection-agency.html" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">like-minded officials</a> who support dismantling policies that curb fossil fuel emissions.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Trump took a major step toward that goal on Tuesday when he <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/donald-trump-climate-change-executive-order-236597" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">signed</a> an executive order rolling back the Clean Power Plan, an Obama administration initiative that aimed to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><b>“We’re getting a lot of requests for expert opinion from the White House,” said Bast. “That’s very new. We haven’t had those calls for eight years. Even 12 years.”</b></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Last week in Washington, D.C., Heartland held its annual conference challenging the idea that there is a scientific consensus on climate change. The conference focused on the future of energy and climate policy under Trump<b>. Bast opened the meeting by saying, “This is a wonderful time to be a global warming realist,”</b> using the term that those in the movement use to describe themselves.</font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">“Those of us in the room who have been working on this issue for a decade or longer can finally stand up and say hallelujah and welcome to the party,” said Bast. He was met with applause from the 200 or so people in the audience.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><b>This isn’t the first time the movement has targeted teachers. As early as 1998, a group of fossil fuel officials, lobbyists and conservative think tanks <a href="http://www.euronet.nl/users/e_wesker/ew@shell/API-prop.html" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">planned</a> to distribute climate-change skeptical curricula for classrooms nationwide. In 2012, an internal Heartland <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/%281-15-2012%29%202012%20Heartland%20Budget%20%282%29.pdf" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">document</a> outlined plans to do the same.</b></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Their message has been embraced by some educators. A survey of 1,500 science teachers nationwide, funded by NCSE and<a href="http://science.sciencemag.org/content/351/6274/664" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;"> published in the journal <span style="box-sizing: border-box;">Science</span> last year</a>, found more than half taught their students that humans are unequivocally causing climate change. But 31 percent of teachers told their students that the cause of climate change is still being debated. About one in 10 teachers teach children that humans had no significant role in climate change, the study showed.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The author of the survey, Eric Plutzer, professor of political science at Pennsylvania State University, said those results reflect the fact that climate change can be challenging to teach: It doesn’t slide neatly into any of the required sciences, comprising some biology, some chemistry and some physics. Science teachers themselves may not have encountered the science of climate change much in their own education.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Bast said he was not shocked that four in 10 teachers mention or advocate contrarian views, though he hesitated to take credit for it.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">“Science teachers are smart. Smarter than the average reporter. Smarter than the average environmental activist,” he said.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Heartland’s mailing campaign began in mid-March. Bast declined to disclose the project cost; the book’s suggested retail price is $6.95. He said the group has been actively fundraising around educational initiatives. The organization’s total budget in 2015, the most recent year available through <a href="https://www.guidestar.org/profile/36-3309812" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">public filings</a>, was $5.3 million.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Bast said the organization has already received several messages from teachers who appreciated the information, or asked for a Heartland speaker to come to class.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">But the campaign is not being well received by everyone.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Lori Baker, a sixth-grade science teacher at North Putnam Middle School in Roachdale, Indiana, found the package in her school mailbox and was dismayed by its contents. “I read quite a bit of the book, actually, and it was extremely frustrating. It’s an attempt to sound science literate, but there’s very little actual data,” she said.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Baker pointed to the first paragraph of the foreword, written by Marita Noon, executive director of Citizens’ Alliance for Responsible Energy, a nonprofit and lobbying group that advocates for the use of fossil fuels. In it, Noon writes that Obama’s <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/21/us/climate-change-us-obama/" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">description</a> of climate change as the greatest threat facing mankind is “laughable” at a time when “ISIS is beheading innocent people.”</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">“That as a foreword to something claiming to be scientific is pretty shocking,” said Baker.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Plutzer said the Heartland book is likely to be dismissed out of hand by teachers like Baker, who already view climate change denial as a fringe movement. But it may be welcomed by those already skeptical of the scientific consensus. “This could increase polarization within the science teaching profession, though probably not a great deal.”</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">That polarization could easily be exacerbated at South Whidbey High School in Washington state, where biology and physics teacher Greg Ballog received the material. Ballog said that one of his colleagues is a “borderline climate denier,” which has already caused tensions in the school’s science department.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">“I’m not going to show this stuff to him,” he said. “It’s pretty slick. I think he might use it.”</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">This story was produced as part of a collaboration between FRONTLINE and <a href="http://thegroundtruthproject.org/" style="box-sizing: border-box; background: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(153, 153, 153); display: inline; transition: background-color 0.25s ease; padding: 0px;">The GroundTruth Project</a> examining climate change and its impact on women and children.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.725em; margin: 1em 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Correction: An earlier version of this story mistakenly said that a 2012 Heartland strategy document was leaked to the press. Rather, the document was acquired from Heartland under false pretenses before being publicly released.</font></p></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">=</font></div></div><div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/heartland-institute-climate-science-2334892782.html">http://www.ecowatch.com/heartland-institute-climate-science-2334892782.html</a></font></font></font></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">
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22px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><b>Koch-Funded Group Tries to Persuade 200,000 Science Teachers That Climate Change Is Debatable</b></font></font></font></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div id="Post09000110000001" class="post-partial articlebody" style="margin-bottom: 40px; overflow: visible !important;"><font face="Times New Roman"><span class="js-scroll-trigger" data-target="body" data-triggers="render-rebelbar" data-toggle-class="with-floating-shares" data-loaded="true" /></font><div id="utm_campaign"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" /></font><div class="article-body js-expandable sm-mb-2 md-mb-4 js-update-url expanded" data-url="http://www.ecowatch.com/heartland-institute-climate-science-2334892782.html" data-headline="Koch-Funded Group Tries to Persuade 200,000 Science Teachers That Climate Change Is Debatable" data-elid="2334892782"><font face="Times New Roman"><font 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face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" 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Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/heartland-institute" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Heartland Institute</a> is trying to nurture the next generation of <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-denier" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">climate change deniers</a>.</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The conservative and libertarian think tank has sent out 25,000 copies of the organization's <a href="https://www.heartland.org/template-assets/documents/publications/12-04-15_why_scientists_disagree.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">book</a>, <em>Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming, </em>and an accompanying 10-minute DVD to 25,000 science teachers this month, according to a <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/climate-change-skeptic-group-seeks-to-influence-200000-teachers/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Frontline</a> report. The book argues that <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">climate change</a> is not settled science.</font></p></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Katie Worth, who authored the Frontline report, <a href="https://twitter.com/katieworth/status/846919035900121088" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">called</a> the effort a "massive propaganda campaign by the nation's leading climate change skeptical think tank."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The Heartland Institute, which has received funding from polluting industries such as <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/exxon" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Exxon</a> and the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/koch-brothers" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Koch</a> family, <a href="https://www.heartland.org/topics/climate-change/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">rejects</a>the scientific community's widespread consensus that human activity causes climate change.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><b>The organization plans to send the materials to another 25,000 teachers every two weeks until every public-school science teacher in the nation has a copy, Heartland president and CEO Joseph Bast said.</b></font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">This means the book and DVD could end up in the mailboxes of <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d15/tables/dt15_209.20.asp?current=yes" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">more than</a> 200,000 K-12 science teachers in the country. </span>The campaign began in mid-March.</font></p><font face="Times New Roman" /><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><font face="Times New Roman"><span times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large">Frontline also published a</span><span times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"> </span><a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3526415-Heartland-Institute-letter-to-educators.html" target="blank" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" text-decoration="text-decoration" none="none" word-wrap="word-wrap" break-word="break-word">cover letter</a><span times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"> </span><span times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large">of the materials from Lennie Jarratt, project manager of <b>Heartland's Center for Transforming Education,</b> who asks that the teacher "consider the possibility" that climate science is not settled.</span></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="text-align: left; transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><span times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"><font face="Times New Roman">img</font></span></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="text-align: left; transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><span times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"><font face="Times New Roman">
</font></span></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><div style="text-align: left;"><b><font face="Times New Roman">The 2015 book is coauthored by Drs. Craig D. Idso, Robert M. Carter and S. Fred Singer, who have been heavily involved in the "debate" over global warming.</font></b></div><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Here are some tidbits about the authors:</font></p><ul style="margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 40px;"><li style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">According to <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/craig-idso" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">DeSmog</a>, Idso believes that "CO2 is not a pollutant" and is the chairman and former resident of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, which has a mission is to "separate reality from rhetoric in the emotionally-charged debate that swirls around the subject of carbon dioxide and global change."</font></li></ul><ul style="margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 40px;"><li style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">Carter, who passed away last year, was an Australian marine geologist and a paid climate change denier, <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Bob_Carter" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">SourceWatch</a> noted. He once asserted that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has not found evidence that global warming was caused by human activity.</font></li></ul><ul style="margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 40px;"><li style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman">Singer, a former space scientist and government scientific administrator, founded the Science & Environmental Policy Project in 1990, a 501(c)(3) "educational group" focusing on global warming denial, according to <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/s-fred-singer" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">DeSmog</a>. Idso and Singer helped develop the Heartland Institute's "Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change. Singer said in Jan. 2016 that "the real threat to humanity comes not from any (trivial) greenhouse warming but from cooling periods creating food shortages and famines."</font></li></ul><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The letter directs teachers to visit <a href="http://www.izzit.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Izzit.org</a> to access an online guide to using the DVD. Izzit.org is a "<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/heartland-institute-tricked-video-subject-in-unstoppable-solar-cycles" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">right-wing advocacy organization</a>" that provides free educational videos to U.S. educators and homeschoolers.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">The <a href="https://ncse.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">National Center for Science Education</a>, an Oakland, California nonprofit that monitors climate change education in classrooms criticized the mailing campaign.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">"It's not science, but it's dressed up to look like science," NCSE executive director Ann Reid told Frontline. "It's clearly intended to confuse teachers."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Climatologist <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/community/michael_mann" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Michael Mann</a> also tweeted that the Heartland Institute is trying to "indoctrinate children with climate denial propaganda."</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Bast, Heartland's president, said that some teachers have appreciated the information and even asked for a Heartland speaker to visit a class.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">However, many science teachers have not welcomed the campaign.</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font face="Times New Roman">As <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Frontline</span> wrote:</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px 10px 20px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Lori Baker, a sixth-grade science teacher at North Putnam Middle School in Roachdale, Indiana, found the package in her school mailbox and was dismayed by its contents. "I read quite a bit of the book, actually, and it was extremely frustrating. It's an attempt to sound science literate, but there's very little actual data," she said. 
</font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px 10px 20px;"><font face="Times New Roman">Baker pointed to the first paragraph of the<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"> foreword, written by <b>Marita Noon, executive director of Citizens' Alliance for Responsible Energy</b>, a nonprofit and lobbying group that advocates for the use of fossil fuels. In it, Noon writes that Obama's <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/21/us/climate-change-us-obama/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; word-wrap: break-word;">description</a> of climate change as the greatest threat facing mankind is "laughable" at a time when "ISIS is beheading innocent people."</span></font></p><p style="text-align: left; line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px 10px 20px;"><font face="Times New Roman">"That as a foreword to something claiming to be scientific is pretty shocking," said Baker.</font></p></div></div></div></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"></font></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="Times New Roman"></font></div></div></div></div></div></div>