Teaching climate science in schools can be valuable, but not when it’s blatantly oriented toward ‘social justice’ and views rationality as an obstacle to learning.
Teaching climate science in schools can be valuable, but not when it’s blatantly oriented toward ‘social justice’ and views rationality as an obstacle to proper learning.
O ne sentence from Washington State’s new high-school curriculum on climate science betrays how bizarre the discussion about teaching science has become:
For too long, science and science education have prioritized my rational thinking.
Instead of prioritizing rational thinking, the purportedly scientific curriculum argues that “we must learn to pay attention to our own emotions and those of other people.”
The curriculum is part of an increasingly overt effort to replace the reasoned and objective scientific search for truth with emotion, political power, “community wisdom,” and “authentic” data that prioritize equity over mere “technical assertions.”
Developed in partnership with the Washington State Department of Health, the set of lessons is one example of how states are applying the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). In Washington State, the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction oversees a program called “ClimeTime” that trains teachers to apply NGSS standards to “climate science learning standards.”
Rather than strengthening the understanding of the scientific method and rigor, the curriculum undermines science by redefining it into meaninglessness. It is the latest warning that educational standards and environmental issues are being polluted by identity politics.
This isn’t the only lesson plan teachers can choose to meet the new standards or to apply climate change to science education. It is unclear how many students in Washington will actually use this particular curriculum. However, the fact that it was developed in partnership with a state agency to specifically meet the state’s standards on science and climate education indicates we are likely to see more of this approach.
This trend will make it vastly more difficult to address environmental risks honestly and effectively, enticing us to choose policy based on ideology rather than science-based approaches to environmental stewardship.
It also threatens to fundamentally undermine the scientific process, turning the word “science” from an open discussion of facts into an empty political slogan that means whatever politicians want.
It is especially ironic coming from a movement that previously lectured people to “follow the science.” Now they are actively weakening the limits that adhering to science and data put on their preferred policy options.
The curriculum examines how climate change is impacting asthma, pregnancy, public health, and “equity & environmental justice in the classroom.” Rather than teaching students how to engage in an objective assessment of data, which is the hallmark of the scientific process, the curriculum argues that scientific assessment must be “contextualized” so that it promotes environmental justice and “equitable discourse.”
The curriculum encourages high-school students to be skeptical of scientific data that contradicts political agendas. Instead of data, it instructs that personal feelings should be our guide, saying that emotional reactions “can signal discord between cultural values and technical assertions.” Ignoring those emotions, the curriculum lectures, “can be perceived as arrogance.”
By undermining the authority of reason and evidence, teachers and activists can shame students into compliance, knowing they can accuse those who cite the scientific process of being insensitive and arrogant. Without being able to cite the scientific process, students are essentially powerless against activist-teachers who are now free to use their authority to get students to comply.
The curriculum shocked Vanessa Ramsey, who was Washington State’s middle-school science teacher of the year in 2011.
Ramsey notes that “during scientific research we must remain impartial and set aside ALL emotion in order to clearly examine the data.” Once scientists have an understanding of an issue, policy-makers can “bring the data into the realm of the social issues and apply the science and discuss how best to move forward to improve the lives of all humans and our environment.” By putting emotion first, the curriculum intentionally narrows what scientific conclusions are allowed, based on politics, not reality.
“The curriculum states that students should look at data, analyze it, and draw scientific conclusions,” said Ramsey, “but in reality, it leads students to predetermined conclusions within the specific parameters of social and environmental justice.”
Sometimes the curriculum’s approach crosses into the absurd.
One section of the curriculum purports to help students use data to study the impacts of climate change on pregnancy. To set the context, one slide introduces a word invented by the eerily named “Bureau of Linguistical Reality.” The bureau invented the word “NonnaPaura” to describe “the simultaneous sensation of a strong natural urge for your children to have children mixed with an equally simultaneous urge to protect these yet unborn grandchildren from a future filled with suffering.” The conclusion is assumed — climate change will create suffering — and the data only provide a measurement of how awful things will be.
In another section, the curriculum encourages students to set aside data in favor of “community wisdom.” What counts as “community wisdom”? How is it different from groupthink or simple political sloganeering? The curriculum doesn’t say. The ultimate determination of when to use community wisdom is to listen to our emotions, even if that contradicts science.
This is a positively medieval mindset. The scientific process is at its most valuable and important when it contradicts or supplements common wisdom, teaching things that would not have otherwise been discovered.
In fact, community wisdom has been the source of many of the racist and sexist beliefs the curriculum’s authors claim to condemn. Undermining the ability of scientific inquiry to rebut ideas that are wrong — but widely believed — removes an important check on ill-considered and destructive falsehoods.
Although Washington is more aggressive than other states when it comes to injecting climate politics into schools, we are likely to see more of this type of anti-science climate curriculum.
It is only the beginning in Washington State. The state’s new biennial budget provides millions more for this. It offers $1.5 million for “development of a climate solutions and climate justice curriculum.” There is another $200,000 to hire “climate science curriculum staff” to “integrate climate change content into the Washington state learning standards,” and $600,000 to develop “open access climate science education curriculum for use in teacher preparation programs.”
The budget also requires Washington’s superintendent of public instruction to “integrate climate change content into the Washington state learning standards across subject areas and grade levels,” requiring that the lessons be “action oriented.”
Climate science can be used to engage students and teach about the value and challenges of rigorous scientific inquiry. Turning the climate curriculum into a political tool undermines the very objective assessment and process of learning that makes science and science education so valuable.
What we see in Washington State is political indoctrination masquerading as school curricula. It seeks to redefine science to restrict it to a certain political agenda. Without the objective authority of science acting as a touchstone, activists can push subjective or baseless political arguments without fear of credible contradiction.
It is manipulative and shameful. And right now, it’s policy in Washington State.