Students need science, math knowledge before environment

Mr. Corti, in his editorial last week, proposes we pile on more environmental teaching into the school curriculum. While on the surface. this is a noble effort, I think we should first ensure our students have a solid foundation in science, mathematics, and biology studies. Then, once they understand basic physics and math, we can share with them the erroneous philosophy of global warming and human induced climate change. The bedrock of global warming is now fractured and broken in light of recent accounts of manipulation of temperature data, increases in the Antarctic ice thickness, and our own knowledge of how the Sun influences weather here on Earth. We couldn't ask for a better example for teaching the definition of poor science is to our children.

Solar panels are perfect for certain applications and parts of the world. But we do not need a school curriculum to teach this. Any common sense can dictate that sunny regions of the world are more apropos for solar power, windy regions for wind power, and regions with oil and gas leaking from the ground for oil and gas power. Even if we did possess the ability to have solar panels everywhere, and electric cars whirring down the street, where would we get the plastics to make the car parts or anything else made of plastic? Or asphalt to pave the roads? Or propane to fire up your grill? Or shingles that need to be replaced because the solar panels installed on your roof started a leak? Or the very color black in all products, which is made from carbon black, an oil product? These and countless other commodities come from a single barrel of oil. Oil, like it or not, is still the bedrock of modern day productivity and growth.

Now, can we improve processes to make things cleaner? Of course, we should and will. This is what begs an integrated, technical school curriculum. I would call it "applied conservation". You could teach a full four years of high school chemistry on the products created from a single barrel of oil, from chemistry of reactions, to interactions with the environment, to waste and recycling methods. Then you could teach about the Environmental Protection Agency. Its foundation was that of necessity due to pollution and waste not being properly disposed, and today we still need its important functions as a government entity. What we do not need is the EPA making its own laws without congressional oversight. So there is an additional social studies lesson for the students on the proper oversight and passage of laws.

I want my children to come home from school free from any government driven agenda. I want them to think on their own and come up with solutions to problems that plague our generation. Teaching them that correlation denotes causation is an erroneous start to their schooling. Such is the case with "carbon dioxide is the cause of global warming," as it was not founded, according to the scientific method. Any program adhering to such a mantra should be viewed skeptically, if at all. Rather, emphasize the basics in physics, math, and science, and allow the marketplace and our children's ingenuity to spur solutions for our problems.

Paul Anderson
Ogdensburg