Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
It is a sign of the times that, despite all of the failures and problems in UK education, the latest curriculum review by the OCR has found that the most glaring omission is climate change education!
It is a sign of the times that, despite all of the failures and problems in UK education, the latest curriculum review by the OCR has found that the most glaring omission is climate change education!
Forget teaching of Maths, English, Foreign Languages, History, Geography and Science, all of which need to be radically improved. Resources must be switched away from and towards indoctrination about the climate:
And let’s be clear – indoctrination is exactly what it will be. Why, otherwise, would they want to “shift behaviour”?
Can you honestly see schools teaching pupils the real facts? That we are still emerging from the dreadful climate of the Little Ice Age? That extreme weather is not increasing? That cold kills many times more people that heat does? That food production is rocketing? That people around the world are immeasurably better off as a direct consequence of fossil fuels?
Of course not. I have no doubt that most teachers will actually take this opportunity to propagate their left-wing agenda unchecked.
They acknowledge that climate change anxiety is a very real problem amongst the young. But they might ask why it is not a problem for older people. What is certain is that the misinformation fed to children, that is responsible for this anxiety, will be doubled down if climate change is added to the curriculum.
But an anxious, pliant younger generation is really what the authorities want:
They want a population which will obey government diktats, change their lifestyles and accept a lower standard of living.
Continuing the transformation of universities from education to indoctrination centers, the University of California, San Diego, has announced the Jane Teranes Climate Change Education Requirement (JTCCER) for incoming first-year students, starting fall 2024. This requirement, approved by the Academic Senate, is a clear example of the university’s shift from fostering critical thinking to promoting a singular ideological agenda.
Continuing the transformation of universities from education to indoctrination centers, the University of California, San Diego, has announced the Jane Teranes Climate Change Education Requirement (JTCCER) for incoming first-year students, starting fall 2024. This requirement, approved by the Academic Senate, is a clear example of the university’s shift from fostering critical thinking to promoting a singular ideological agenda.
The JTCCER is presented under the doublespeak guise of “empowering students with knowledge and skills”, however, by mandating a specific viewpoint on a complex and multifaceted issue, UC San Diego is effectively narrowing the intellectual horizons of its students, guiding them towards a predetermined conclusion rather than encouraging open inquiry.
Indoctrination Disguised as Education
The requirement does not increase the number of courses for graduation, but it does increase the ideological load.
Courses approved to satisfy the JTCCER will overlap with general education or Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) courses, as well as courses that apply to major and minor requirements.
Courses approved for the JTCCER will overlap with general education or Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) courses, as well as major and minor requirements. This integration ensures that the climate change narrative permeates various aspects of the undergraduate curriculum, leaving little room for dissenting perspectives or critical analysis.
The Illusion of Choice
While the list of courses satisfying the JTCCER will be made publicly available, the real choice is illusory. The courses, undoubtedly, will be designed to align with the prevailing climate change orthodoxy, offering a one-sided view of a highly debatable field. This approach stifles academic freedom and critical thinking, turning education into a tool for ideological conformity.
Honoring Ideology over Inquiry
The JTCCER is named in honor of the late Jane Teranes, a teaching professor known for her contributions to climate change education. It symbolizes the university’s commitment to a specific ideological stance, rather than a dedication to unbiased academic inquiry.
The Future of Academic Freedom
The formation of a new Senate committee to oversee the JTCCER’s implementation is a concerning development. It indicates a long-term commitment to embedding this ideological stance in the university’s curriculum. The committee’s role in finalizing criteria for JTCCER courses further consolidates the control over what perspectives are deemed acceptable.
Conclusion: A Step Towards Ideological Uniformity
UC San Diego’s JTCCER is another in a long line of troubling steps towards ideological uniformity and intellectual conformity. The ongoing shift from education to indoctrination, where students are molded into ideologically aligned activists rather than being equipped with the critical thinking skills necessary to navigate complex issues, has become of hallmark of universities nationwide.
Indoctrination happens through many channels—entertainment, speeches, and censorship––but its main instrument is the school system. Teachers have a captive audience of malleable young minds for several years.
Just Stop Oil funder Dale Vince is pressing ahead with plans to flood British primary schools with environmental and Net Zero societal propaganda. Children aged 11 and under are being taught that they face an unprecedented global climate emergency, with the possibility that the planet is entering a sixth mass extinction. The solution of course is “sustainability” and green energy, a matter that is dear to the heart of multi-millionaire Vince. His ageing onshore wind farm company Ecotricity has collected £110 million in green taxpayer subsidies over the last 20 years, at a time when he has pocketed at least £43 million in various corporate payments.
The Ministry of Eco Education (MEE) was started by Vince in 2021 with the stated aim of “greening up the curriculum”. From an initial base of 15 ‘pioneer’ schools, it is working to scale this up to 1,000. MEE operates by inserting its messaging into all aspects of primary learning including transport, energy, food, nature and society. It aims to “save teachers time”, and it claims to have “rearranged the national curriculum” around what it describes as big questions. MEE also claims to be working with secondary schools to adapt its primary approach to Key Stage 3.
Although few lesson examples are available on the MEE website, it is easy to piece together some of the ideas being taught. A lesson on veganism notes that industrial farming has negative impacts on the planet, but apparently “isn’t just about food”. Most of the sources quoted are little more than promotions for veganism with a link to a Guardian article explaining why vegans don’t eat honey. There does not appear to be any discussion about the wisdom of removing all types of animal protein from the diets of very young children, something that many scientists think should be done only under strict nutritional supervision.
The education leader of MEE is Paul Turner and a video is supplied of him talking to a group of young children in the Ecotricity tent at the Womad festival. Bouncing around a giant globe, he explains that the correct level of carbon dioxide in the planet is the ‘magic’ number of 360 parts per million (ppm). Quite how he is able to point to such a precise – if magical – figure to stop the climate changing is not explained. There are many eminent scientists who think it is a little on the low side for animal and plant life to prosper. Certainly, the children are not told the dinosaurs lived in a world of plant plenty at a time when CO2 levels were much higher. Turner, who is described by MEE as a “radical geographer”, tells the children that we need to “hoover” up all the gas, and on this front Dale is making a contribution.
In fact the current level of CO2 is around 420 ppm and recent increases are believed to have led to a dramatic 14% greening of the planet. Hoover up all this extra CO2 and veganism starts to seem an ‘unsustainable’ option. Remove nitrogen fertiliser from agriculture as many eco-extremists want and the consequent massive reduction in crop yields starts to look like mass famine.
But then it isn’t just about the planet is it? In a paper published by MEE titled ‘Foundations for an Eco Curriculum’, it is said that “we are increasingly recognising that any efforts to tackle climate and ecological emergency must also respond to the structural inequalities inherent in society”. Furthermore, “any eco school curriculum must explore ideas of social structures and processes as much as they do the natural environment, as well as exploring the intersection of ideas such as gender, race and inequality. From a young age, children are aware of injustice and can apply ideas of fairness and the environment.”
In other words, children can be caught young and brainwashed with horrific, largely unsubstantiated tales of climate and ecological collapse – a process they have no intellectual ability to question – and be marched towards a collectivist society where ruling elites remove many personal freedoms and lifestyle choices. Oh, and energy can be provided by useless windmills requiring enormous public subsidies by enlightened philanthropists such as Mr. D. Vince.
Needless to say, MEE is not the only green educational propogandist operating in the U.K. As the Daily Sceptic reported earlier this year, other elite money is pouring into British schools. London-based Climate Science aims to supply free teaching materials, with children encouraged to plot implausible temperatures rises of 11°C, taught that alkaline oceans are ‘acidic’ and write letters to policymakers claiming “our house is on fire” in the style of Greta Thunberg. Among the billionaire backers are Schmidt Futures – the family foundation of former Google boss Eric Schmidt – and the Grantham Institute at Imperial, partly funded by green billionaire investor Jeremy Grantham.
MEE is also involved with the Young Green Briton Challenge, which has also attracted the ambassadorial support of TV activist Chris Packham. The new scheme operates on a Dragons’s Den format with 16 schools competing to win a £1,000 stake for a green project. Recently, Packham gave his backing to eco-protesters breaking the law and suggested that a “radical flank” could attempt to blow up oil refineries. For his part, Vince has given hundreds of thousands of pounds to Just Stop Oil, a group that engages in civil disobedience and criminal damage.
What a fine example these men set for the youth of today.
Chris Morrison isthe Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
As with two sides of the same ideological coin, the embrace of human causation as the “predominant” factor in a changing climate coincides with activism in climate curriculum, including assignments and projects for students to undertake to save the planet.
SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA – SEPTEMBER 20: Thousands of school students and protesters gather in The Domain ahead of a climate strike rally on September 20, 2019 in Sydney, Australia. Rallies held across Australia are part of a global mass day of action demanding action on the climate crisis. (Photo by Jenny Evans/Getty Images)
America’s K-12 classrooms are increasingly becoming indoctrination centers for a one-sided view of climate change, aka, global warming and the supposed existential threat to humankind. The Biden administration, universities, left-of-center think tanks and state governments are developing and spreading climate change curriculum that also contains an explicit activist bent to turn the nation’s children into climate crusaders.
While climate and weather issues are not a recent curriculum topic in America’s elementary and secondary school classrooms, the teaching and content has accelerated in recent years.
By 2013 the Next Generation Science Standards were developed by the National Research Council and other non-profit groups, along with two dozen states. These standards recommended that “man-made climate change” be taught beginning in the fifth grade and incorporated into all science classes.
The degree to which states comply with these or other climate standards remains voluntary. In 2020, the National Center for Science Education and the Texas Freedom Network Education Fund—organizations that fanatically embrace global warming—assigned “grades” on the extent states adopted climate change curriculum and indoctrination. Twenty-seven states received a grade of “B+” or higher on their respective climate curriculum, while 20 states got a “C+” or lower, among which ten received “D” and six states received an “F” grade.
As with two sides of the same ideological coin, the embrace of human causation as the “predominant” factor in a changing climate coincides with activism in climate curriculum, including assignments and projects for students to undertake to save the planet.
According to Radhika Iyengar, director of education at the Columbia University Climate School, which promotes one-sided climate education, the teaching of climate change should include “caring for each other and caring for the planet,” he said. “If you’re not emotionally connect with your environment, it’s very difficult to save it.”
Climate writer Renee Cho further described climate education this way: “What helps students deal with their feelings are solutions, so teachers need to offer opportunities for collective action and problem solving…promoting understanding of environmental justice issues …also introducing a spiritual connection with nature.”
Man-made climate indoctrination is what is sought for children, and it is spreading in America’s K-12 public schools.
In 2020, New Jersey became the first state to mandate climate curriculum across all subjects beginning in kindergarten, including science, social studies, physical education, computer science, and the arts — both visual and performing arts.
Last year, Connecticut followed suit by adopting a law to require science classes to include lessons on man-made climate change, its impact, and potential solutions. State assessments for grades 5, 8, and 11 include questions about students’ understanding of climate change.
In Massachusetts, in the current 2023 school year, more than a dozen high schools have adopted a pilot climate education program developed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Climate Action Through Education (CATE) program. The program developers are looking to spread the curriculum nationwide that will include lessons for subject areas beyond science and “opportunities for students to explore climate solutions.”
MIT professor Christopher Knittel, the leader of the CATE program, said, “we will be honest about the threats posed by climate change but also give students a sense of agency that they can do something about this.”
Still, other one-sided climate change education programs are listed here, which invariably go back to manipulating children’s emotions and turning them into political activists.
The Nature Conservancy is about preparing students “for the world ahead and empowering them to advocate for change.” Its climate educator, Jaime Gonzalez said, “I would literally start with footage of people being rescued from Hurricane Harvey,” then explain how climate change “made the storm more destructive.” Historical storm activity is ignored since it refutes such drivel.
The Biden administration also is infusing one-sided climate education. The U.S. Department of Education’s “climate action” plan is about “support[ing] states, districts, schools, and institutions of higher education by disseminating resources related to school facilities and climate education.” Multiple federal agencies also have established curriculum content, including the EPA, NOAA, and the National Science Foundation.
A report released in April 2023 by Teachers College at Columbia University claims that 80 percent of parents surveyed support climate change being taught in elementary and secondary schools, although the level of support varies by ideology, according to the authors.
However, parental support for climate curriculum as part of their child’s education does not necessarily translate to embracing the ideological one-sided nature of climate curriculum.
Two separate polls conducted in the last year by OnMessage, Inc. and the Senate Opportunity Fund found overwhelming support across party and ideological lines that: Schools should be focused on teaching the basics and stop focusing on pushing a political philosophy. Parents should be able to move their children to a different school if they believe their school has become too political.
The evidence that most parents and teachers support climate change education should be part of K-12 curriculum, combined with their opposition to political agendas and ideology in the classroom, provides an opportunity to fill the void in America’s classrooms. Children deserve climate facts and realities by using scientifically sound, agenda-free climate components to K-12 curriculum.
He has researched and advocated for a variety of policy issues, including education reform and fiscal policy, both in the non-profit sector and in government in the administration of former New York Governor George Pataki.
He previously wrote and edited The Chalkboard weblog for the NY Charter Schools Association, and has been published in numerous media outlets, including The Hill, New York Post, Washington Times and the Wall Street Journal.
It is not clear who the video is aimed at, but given the babyish cartoons it certainly is not adults. And if it is kids, then the BBC is insulting their intelligence be presuming that they are incapable of being given the facts.
It is not clear who the video is aimed at, but given the babyish cartoons it certainly is not adults. And if it is kids, then the BBC is insulting their intelligence be presuming that they are incapable of being given the facts.
So, for the sake of the BBC and the soppy psychotherapist who helped make the video, here is a simple guide for talking to children about climate change:
Give them the facts
Explain that there have always been bad weather and disasters, and that many more people used to die from them.
Tell them that the world is not going to end tomorrow, and no serious scientist says it will.
Remind them that they are much better off in all sorts of ways than any other generation in human history, all thanks to fossil fuels.
Show them how our environment is now much cleaner than it has been for centuries
Point out that this country and the West in general have already made big strides in reducing emissions.
Also explain that developing countries want more fossil fuels, so that their inhabitants can share some of the things children in this country take for granted.
And, by the way, tell them that there are many more polar bears around than there were before they were born!
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