NCSE was prominently featured in Inside Climate News's exposé (July 31, 2023) of "The Kids Guide to the Truth about Climate Change," published by Ever Bright Media, a company founded by former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee.
"[T]hough its title claims to present the 'truth,' science educators and climate researchers have found the guide to be full of factual inaccuracies," Inside Climate News explained. "It's propaganda," NCSE's deputy director Glenn Branch declared. "It's highly slanted with a clear ideological message, and it's very unreliable as a guide to climate change for kids."
Branch was credited as observing that the booklet "notes that China’s greenhouse gas emissions are 2.5 times higher than the U.S., ignoring the fact that per capita emissions in the U.S. are actually close to twice those in China, and that the U.S. remains the largest historic emitter of climate warming gasses."
He also noted that a graph that purports to show "Thousands of Years of Carbon Dioxide Levels" is misleading. "But the data the graph labels as 'present day' — peaking at a little over 280 parts per million — actually represents levels from 2,300 years ago, around 391 BC, Branch pointed out." Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration is now above 420 parts per million.
Also quoted in the article were Jason R. Wiles of Syracuse University, a recent recipient of NCSE's Friend of Darwin award, who commented, "Apart from [the booklet's] being very misleading, my main concern is that it fosters complacency by promoting the notion that climate change is not as dire a problem as it truly is."
And Melissa Lau, a veteran science teacher in Oklahoma and a Teacher Ambassador for NCSE, suggested that teachers in underresourced schools are particularly vulnerable to climate disinformation such as "The Kids Guide."
