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Environmentalist propaganda, sound science and economics, free-enterprise economy, environmental entrepreneurship -- these are the new vocabulary words of the environmental educator. No longer can the environmentalist, educator, naturalist, or park ranger act as an expert only in their respective fields. To do so means that one is radical, an eco-terrorist, anti-industry, short-sighted, and only interested in scaring children. One can no longer take his or her love for the environment and the joy gained by sharing that love and simply share it with others.

We must now become experts not only on the environment but also economics, public policy, and politics. Otherwise we are accused of being biased and only examining one side of the issue. In the rush to denounce all things environmental as not based on ‘sound science’ and ‘anti-industry,’ all environmental education materials and educators have been criticized and accused of being inaccurate, unfair, and fanatical. Ask any respectable educator, whether they teach biology, environmental science, or chemistry, and they will attest to the fact that the majority of curricular material is biased in some manner and often contains dated and/or incorrect information.

Nonetheless, this does not provide adequate reason to dismiss all of the information as unusable. Rather it is the job of the educator and his/her support staff to recognize any discrepancies and supplement as needed. Unfortunately the organizations most actively criticizing the present state of environmental education would rather eliminate the current information available in favor of their own 'sound' information and curriculum. Instead of teaching, it now seems that educators must divert a great deal of their attention to defending.

As awareness of this growing front of attacks and criticisms of environmental education emerged, it was natural to assume that they would most reasonably come from a group of concerned scientists who wanted to insure that the proper information was being given to educators, and in turn, to students. Instead there was found an emergence of conservative, public policy think tanks, which had begun to focus their efforts on questioning the validity of concern for the environment and promote their own brand of “sound science,” usually by encouraging the purchase of their own, ‘environmental education’ materials.

One might question the use of the word attack, but that is exactly what it is. These groups, especially the Center for Environmental Education Research run by Michael Sanera and the Political Economy Research Center which houses Jane Shaw, pick a target, usually a state with a legislatively established environmental education program, and focus all of their attention and resources on trying to get the programs eliminated from governmental budgets and divert the funds to other market-based programs.

This trend has been well documented by several organizations including the National Environmental Education Advancement Project at the University of Wisconsin, the Center for Commercial Free Public Education, and the National Audubon Society. The most interesting, and frustrating, quality of all of these attacks is that they are usually spearheaded not by ecologists, conservation biologists, chemists, or environmental scientists, but by economists, public policy analysts, and political scientists.

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