Elizabeth Harrington documents for the Washington Free Beacon more waste of federal tax dollars in the global warming debate. This example involves one of this state’s major public universities.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture is spending $150,000 in an effort to change farmers who have a “skeptical” view of human-caused global warming.
The agency issued a grant to North Carolina State University to conduct an educational campaign for high school teachers to add more climate change material to their curriculums.
The target of the campaign is the agricultural community, which the project characterizes as cynical of anthropogenic climate change.
“Among the agricultural and natural resource sciences for climate variability and change, education is vital as it can increase climate change knowledge and risk perception, precursors to climate change action,” the grant said. “Education is critical among the agricultural community because although climate change threatens agricultural sustainability, skepticism of anthropogenic climate change runs high.”
The project is seeking to change that by “leveraging the power of younger generations.”
“Reaching agricultural audiences can be challenging because worldview-driven biases can prevent agricultural professionals from engaging in adaptation or mitigation efforts,” the grant said. “Providing worldview-compatible climate curricula to K-12 agricultural classrooms may be a key strategy. Agriculture teachers have considerable influence over future agricultural and natural resource professionals, and adolescents may be less susceptible to worldview-driven biases.”
The study will recruit at least 40 high school teachers who will “integrate climate change topics into existing Agricultural Science curriculum.” The researchers hope to reach 2,000 high school students in two years.
