‘The adoption of these standards is much more than an added educational requirement; it is a symbol of a partnership between generations…’
(Michael Barnes, Liberty Headlines) Al Gore will never be president of the United States. Instead, his legacy will be cashing in on the climate change debate.
On Thursday, Gore scored his latest climate-celebrity moment when he praised New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy and his wife, both fellow Democrats, for mandating climate change education in K-12 public schools, including for children as young as 5 years old.
“I am incredibly proud that New Jersey is the first state in the nation to fully integrate climate education in their K-12 curricula,” Gore said.
“This initiative is vitally important to our students as they are the leaders of tomorrow, and we will depend on their leadership and knowledge to combat this crisis,” he added.
New Jersey First Lady Tammy Murphy spearheaded the public relations outreach for the radical curriculum, and the State Board of Education adopted Gov. Murphy’s new education proposal this week.
The proposal was supposedly inspired by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg and climate change walkouts in schools across the U.S. and Europe last year.
The program will affect 1.4 million students and go into effect in 2021.
But the plan doesn’t just involve pushing climate change in science classes, but also in social studies, technology, visual and performing arts, foreign languages and physical education.
“In New Jersey, we have already begun to experience the effects of climate change, from our disappearing shorelines, to harmful algal blooms in our lakes, superstorms producing torrential rain, and summers that are blazing hot,” said Tammy Murphy.
“The adoption of these standards is much more than an added educational requirement; it is a symbol of a partnership between generations,” she said.
Course planning details will begin to be developed in the coming months, though the recent guidelines suggest middle and high school students will be using information derived from government agencies.
Elementary school children and kindergartners will participate in climate change-related activities, such as building “a schoolyard habitat to see what improvements need to be made to guard plants, animals and humans from the effects of a warming planet.”