How Florida quietly removed climate change content from textbooks

In Florida, climate change content has been quietly removed from high school textbooks, according to an investigation by WUSF and The Hechinger Report. The changes, made in the summer of 2024, either watered down or eliminated crucial information about the climate crisis. For instance, in McGraw Hill's Marine Science book, the term "climate change" was altered to "changes in the environment."

An environmental science textbook by Cengage removed the word "polluting" in front of "coal burning power plants." The investigation also found that a reference to students at the University of Washington voting to pay higher fees to support renewable energy was removed from a textbook. These changes were requested by Florida education officials and made without the textbooks needing to comply with state science standards.

Glenn Branch, deputy director of the National Center for Science Education, stated that weakening the treatment of climate change in textbooks is highly unusual. Florida is currently in the process of updating its science standards for the first time since 2008, but it remains uncertain whether climate change education will be included in any classes.

State education officials have not commented on the matter. Concerning the political climate, Gov. Ron DeSantis officially removed references to climate change from state statutes in May 2024. Public school teachers are particularly vulnerable to political influence, with the Republican-led state making it easier for parents to sue teachers and ban books.

Meanwhile, climate scientists agree that human activities, such as burning fossil fuels, have led to rising global temperatures and severe weather events in Florida.