Photo by AlexiusHoratius. CC BY-SA 3.0.
New Hampshire's House Resolution 30, prefiled on December 11, 2023, would, if adopted, urge the legislature "and by extension the department of education [to] consider compiling and disseminating climate education curricula to school districts so that teachers may be prepared to implement climate change education in their classrooms in high schools, middle schools, and elementary schools."
The preamble to the resolution asserts that the state's "students are not getting comprehensive information about the scientific and human impacts of climate change" (although New Hampshire's standards received a B+ in "Making the Grade?") and that "today's teachers should be provided the resources they need to be able to include climate change in their curriculums and lesson plans so that they are supported in this endeavor by the state."
The resolution specifies that the climate education curricula should include, among other things, "[a]n acknowledgment that human activities have caused a crisis we are working to solve today" and "[h]istorical background of the fossil fuel industry, including elements of the industrial revolution, greenwashing, and the deliberate misinformation campaigns by big oil and gas companies to misinform the public about the effects of climate change."
The resolution is sponsored by Wendy Thomas (D-District 12) and Tony Caplan (D-District 8). It will be officially introduced on January 3, 2024, and referred to the House Education Committee. The most recent climate change education measure in New Hampshire was House Bill 1635 in 2020, which would have required climate education in the state's public schools; the bill died in committee in the same year.
