Analysis | Texas Schools Flunk Climate Change With Faulty Textbooks

Children in the second-biggest educational market in the US are being taught that the issue is a matter of controversy and debate. What’s worse, the Lone Star State isn’t alone. Climate change should not be a debate in schools.Photographer: Chris Hondros/Hulton Archive via Getty Images David Foster Wallace had this joke in which an old fish passes by a couple of young fish and says, “Morning boys. How’s the water?” And one of the young fish later responds, “What the hell is water?” The joke being that the young fish had never before stopped to consider his environment and can’t imagine being in one for which he is not perfectly adapted. As Wallace explained, “the most obvious, important realities are often the ones that are hardest to see and talk about.” Which brings us to climate. This is the water in which humans swim, but many of us are no more conscious of it than Wallace’s fish. Young humans urgently need to learn how coming changes to the climate will affect every aspect of their lives and what they can do to resist and adapt. But older humans responsible for such education aren’t always helpful.