Alana Goodman writes for the Washington Free Beacon about a clear waste of taxpayers’ money.
The federal government is pouring millions of dollars each year into an environmental activist group that teaches children the United States exists on “occupied/unceded/seized territory” and offers tips on how to deal with “climate change emotions,” according to public spending records.
The National Environmental Education Foundation (NEEF), a congressionally chartered nonprofit organization, receives annual government funding and has its board of directors appointed by the Environmental Protection Agency. It is also tasked with organizing National Public Lands Day, a celebration the president proclaims each year.
NEEF published “A Guide to Indigenous Land Acknowledgement” for participants to use during those National Public Lands Day events, recommending that hosts begin with a statement declaring that “local Native groups” are the “traditional inhabitants of the lands you’re on.”
Organizers should consider their “own place in the story of colonization and of undoing its legacy,” the guide says, and “make explicit mention of the occupied, unceded nature of the territory in which a gathering is taking place.”
NEEF included an example statement in its guide: “We would like to begin by acknowledging that the land on which we gather is the occupied/unceded/seized territory of the _________ People.”
The group coauthored the land acknowledgment guide with the Department of Arts and Culture, a nonprofit organization that recently published a comic book calling President Donald Trump a “fascist” and promoting a boycott against Elon Musk.
Another NEEF education program teaches middle school teachers how to “address climate change emotions in the classroom.” The organization claims that climate “anxiety” is widespread in U.S. schools and affects students’ daily lives, providing “guidance for channeling student anxiety into action” and “tactics to integrate climate emotions lessons into instruction.”
One lesson plan asks students to fill out a “Climate Emotions Wheel” in which they draw or write down their feelings. Proposed emotions include “outrage,” “despair,” “panic,” and “shame.”
