Climate denialism in public education classrooms. Several families from the CEIPSO Adolfo Suárez in Madrid claim that a Primary teacher at the center told their children that they would get a better grade on an exam if, in a question related to climate change, they answered what he had told them: “It doesn’t exist. “It’s manipulation.”
“As a result of taking the Natural Sciences exam, when my son returns from school he tells me that, when asked about questions related to climate change, he had responded that ‘they want to manipulate us, that climate change does not exist’,” he says in conversation. with elDiario.es the father of one of the students, who requests anonymity for fear that the complaint will affect his children in some way.
“I asked him how he had put that if he didn’t say it in the book,” he continues, “and he told me that because the professor, who is also his tutor, had told them in class that they could answer whatever they wanted, but that if they answered What he had commented on the subject would have a better note. So both my son and several of his classmates, who wanted to get a good grade, gave that answer,” he declares.
The story has come from at least four families at the school. Their ten-year-old children have told them the same experiences, which are not limited only to these denialist ideas. They also state that, when the DANA occurred in Valencia, the professor in question spread in several different classes that it was a phenomenon orchestrated by politicians. “He said that the government had been the one that had opened some floodgates to kill people, which seemed very serious to me,” says the parent of another student.
In addition to the climate issue, family members highlight that this teacher carries out activities such as showing films in the subject of Values as Dumb and Dumbera film for ages 12 and up that has some profanity and nudity scenes. “The children covered themselves, blushing, at some scenes and he laughed. There was no justification behind it: we asked our children if he had shown them that movie because he wanted to teach them something related to values, and they told us no,” they explain. Also, according to complaints, he has made comments in the center such as “Franco was a hero” or “thank goodness Trump won.”
elDiario.es has tried to obtain the teacher’s version by requesting to contact the teacher through the center’s management, but has not received a response.
They do not notice interest from the center
The families regret that they have not noticed a marked interest in resolving the situation on the part of the center’s management, despite the fact that, they affirm, the teacher has been at CEIPSO for years having this type of behavior, which “is on everyone’s lips.” .
According to them, both the previous management team and the current one have received complaints, but nothing changes and they feel trapped. “I can’t go complain to him because my daughter might get mad. Other families have gone to the address precisely to avoid this. “They said they would call his attention, but several weeks have passed and nothing has happened,” they say.
One of the parents claims that he has thought about changing his daughter’s school, since he is her guardian and spends a lot of time with her and her classmates. “When my daughter gets to secondary school, how is she going to get there?” he exclaims. “My son began to doubt. He told me: ‘I’m not very clear about whether climate change exists or not.’ That’s the problem: they are at a very impressionable age. Because this is said, for example, to some 18-year-old kids, and perhaps they already have clearer ideas, but at 10 years old…”, denounces another of the affected families.
They are worried that their children no longer know what information to integrate or not integrate from this teacher. “That my daughter has to think that a teacher is lying to her… She goes to school to learn, she thinks they are teaching her real things, but this man can suddenly tell her a lie. She already doubts what he tells her. Once he told me: ‘How do I know if what this man teaches me is true?’” says one mother.
The CEIPSO defends that the complaint was not made formally, but was transmitted orally to the secretary so that she could forward it to the director. Although they are informed about the problem with the exams, they have not reviewed them
For their part, the center maintains that the parents’ complaint was not made formally, but was transmitted verbally to the secretary so that she could forward it to the director. Furthermore, they claim that they spoke with this teacher a few days ago, but that he denied the facts and maintained that “the children in the exams had to put what he said in the book.”
The director affirms that “he is not a confrontational teacher and has never had any complaints at the center” and that the first step that parents must take is “to issue things formally. “Accusations cannot be made in the air.” Although they are informed about the problems with the exams, the management reports that they have not reviewed them. The families assure that in these tests there are traces of what they denounce.
What to do as a parent in a case like this?
Jesús Marrodán, president of the Union of Education Inspectors (USIE), affirms that, in the event that it is demonstrated that this is happening – which could easily be known by checking the exams -, it would be grounds for a possible sanction, since that “this teacher could not be respecting the didactic programming. Coercion in the case of the exam is something that cannot be done. He has to respect the official curriculum and the free expression of the students and adjust to that. Furthermore, on any issue, it must maintain a neutral position based on science. The line is to maintain the legal regulations and what the educational curriculum establishes.” Furthermore, remember that, although professors have a certain academic freedom, they should not make political assessments of any kind, “either for or against anyone. They have to be neutral, as much as they can.”
The families explain that they will write a complaint to the Directorate of the Territorial Area of the Community of Madrid (DAT), something that Marrodán also recommends. María del Carmen Morillas, president of the FAPA Giner de los Ríos (the main federation of AMPAs in public schools in the Community of Madrid), explains that, in these types of cases, it is recommended that the families involved, after requesting a meeting with the management team and with the tutor (through a formal request) so that “the center is aware”, they made a writing with what had been discussed in that meeting and registered it in the same center. “After that, depending on how the situation is, you would have to give it a copy to the Inspection and then go and make an appointment directly with the educational inspection,” he says.
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