So it appears the American Coal Federation has taken an interest in molding young minds, specifically educating them to all the wonders and benefits of coal.  Shocking. This article published in Mother Jones explains the questionable partnership between the ACF and the largest publisher of children’s books, Scholastic. ACF created fourth grade lesson plans that included worksheets (and family take-home activities!) asking, “what are the benefits to this kind of energy?”  The converse — say, environmental damage, global warming, mining dangers — were never posed as a questions.

That will teach the kids critical thinking skills!

I especially recommend reading ACF’s blog post heralding their Scholastic partnership for “energy education.”  It lays out their attempts at getting their materials into the hands of  a “critical mass” of teachers — 66,000.  This partnership apparently started in 2007, and by 2009 Kentucky’s teachers were targeted as ACF’s PR reps.