After Pushback, Utah 6th Graders Won’t Learn About Climate Change

Students at North Mac CUSD number 34 elementary school are seen asking questions in Randi Anderson's 6th grade language art class Friday, Jan. 6, 2012 in Girard, Ill. A special Illinois commission says that requiring... Students at North Mac CUSD number 34 elementary school are seen asking questions in Randi Anderson's 6th grade language art class Friday, Jan. 6, 2012 in Girard, Ill. A special Illinois commission says that requiring hundreds of school districts to merge, as the Girard and Virden schools did, could cost state government billions of dollars. (AP Photo/Seth Perlman) MORE LESS
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After complaints from parents about new science education standards, Utah officials edited the standards to push back classroom discussion of climate change from sixth to eighth grade, the Salt Lake Tribune reported on Tuesday.

Students in sixth grade will learn that the greenhouse gas effect “maintains Earth’s energy balance and a relatively constant temperature,” according to the Salt Lake Tribune.

April Mitchell, a science specialist in the Ogden School District, told the Tribune that she was disappointed in the changes to the sixth grade curriculum.

“My concern was that it would create a misconception that our temperature currently is constant,” she said. “I think taking that out is withholding evidence from students.”

The state had put the new science standards on hold in February after parents and state education board officials voiced concern that students would be learning about climate change and evolution. The standards released in February had been based on the Next Generation Science Standards, which address climate change and have been adopted by numerous states.

David Crandall, the chair of the state education board, told the Tribune that the state did not edit the science standards for political reasons.

“We’re not going to make any irrational moves just based on political opinions one way or the other,” he said.

If the latest draft of the standards is approved by the school board in December, they will go into effect for the 2017-2018 school year.

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  1. Keep the womenfolk barefoot and pregnant, and keep the children docile and ignorant – that’s pretty much the standard motto of all the states that claim to give such a damn about “family values.”

  2. Avatar for dnl dnl says:

    Be sure that the Utah Middle Schoolers are told that ClimateChange is a dirty term…

    …and wait for the Climate Change hits mount up.

  3. Dateline: October 15, 2017

    Utah officials edited the standards to push back classroom discussion of climate change from eighth to tenth grade, the Salt Lake Tribune reported on Tuesday.

    Dateline: October 15, 2019

    Utah officials edited the standards to push back classroom discussion of climate change from high school to college, the Salt Lake Tribune reported on Tuesday.

  4. And the children will sit with the frogs in the simmering water, thinking the temperature is relatively constant, as it slowly starts to boil.

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