WV Repeals Changes to Climate Science Standards

By Chris Robey

Following a heated public rebuke, the West Virginia Board of Education reversed its decision to alter newly proposed national K-12 science education standards. The board’s alterations would have required West Virginia teachers to frame human-caused climate change as a debate rather than an accepted body of evidence.

Teachers and environmental groups denounced the alterations as an attempt to undermine peer-reviewed evidence of climate change.

The newly restored standards will be open for public comment until mid-February. In March, the board will vote on final standards for the 2016-17 school year. If adopted, the standards will mark the first time West Virginia students are required to study evidence supporting human-caused climate change.

The reversal comes just days after the conservation group, Friends of the Blackwater, released a report highlighting rising temperatures in the state’s Allegheny Highlands region. View the report, titled “On the Chopping Block,” at alleghenyclimate.org