Below is information to help prepare for addressing a school board.  Included are facts and statistics about environmental education to use in opening and closing statements.  Also included are sample questions that can be modified to ask school board members about promoting EE programs in your community.  They are to help you feel more prepared to address school board members.  

Opening Statement:	Support for environmental education  in our schools has been documented in many ways.   A recent Roper Poll indicated the 96% of the nation's parents want environmental education taught in their school.   The Wisconsin legislature has passed statutes requiring school districts to develop, implement and evaluate K-12 EE Curriculum Plans The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction has developed an "Environmental Education Curriculum Planning Guide" and EE Standards. We believe that our school district should place more emphasis on environmental education in the curriculum and we have several questions we would like to ask...
Questions:	We are interested in hearing how members of the school board feel about the importance of providing a sound environmental education to the children of our district. Wisconsin statutes require every school district to develop, implement and evaluate a K-12 Environmental Education Curriculum Plan.  We would appreciate it if one of our school administrators would provide their perspective on the status of the EE curriculum plan in our district.  When was it developed?  How was it disseminated?  Have our teachers been trained to effectively implement the plan? What procedures are in place for evaluating the EE curriculum plan and its implementation? (If a curriculum evaluation has occurred)  How are the results of the evaluation being used to guide future curriculum planning related to environmental education? Does the school district support staff development in the area of environmental education?  How?  To what degree? How much funding do EE programs receive in this school district?  What specifically is the funding used for?  How can funding for EE programs be increased? How many of our district's teachers have a copy of the DPI EE Guidelines?
Closing Statement:	We strongly believe that more attention needs to be paid to achieving environmental literacy in our district's s students.   The ability to understand environmental issues and make decisions on complex issues is an essential part of our children's education. Because EE emphasizes problem solving and critical thinking skills, it will strengthen our overall educational program Several national studies show that students from schools with EE programs test higher on standardized tests than those students who attend schools without EE. We hope the district will begin a process to insure that our students are provided a solid education, and part of that is environmental education.