ExxonMobil Corp. announced this month that it would join the corporate exodus from an influential conservative nonprofit group following a clash over climate change policy. The nation’s largest oil and gas company provided a strong voice on the green and winning side of a debate over whether or not to push to loosen regulation of greenhouse gases.

Even as ExxonMobil and the world’s other major energy companies have finally started envisioning a lower-carbon world, here in Texas, the Texas Natural Gas Foundation is endorsing a science education curriculum for a future workforce that seems mired in the past. Although industry advocates collaborated with the University of Texas and a state energy office to engage teachers to prepare the curriculum, an investigation by the Austin American-Statesman’s Asher Price found that they worked closely with the curriculum writers and offered edits to the material.

State Rep. Jason Isaac, co-founder and president of the Texas Natural Gas Foundation, told the Statesman he wanted to “get the bias against certain Texas energy resources out of our schools.” But Isaac’s ties to the industry bring their own bias. The Dripping Springs Republican, who sits on the state House energy resources and urban affairs committee, has taken tens of thousands of dollars in political contributions from the oil and gas industry, the Statesman reported, citing government watchdog group Texans for Public Justice.

Teachers and university officials involved in developing the curriculum said that they were not under any undue influence. And it’s a good thing for children to understand how vital oil and gas remain to America’s energy supply. Everything from bicycle tires to football cleats to fishing rods relies on petroleum byproducts.

Here’s the problem: it largely ignores climate change and global warming. By relegating a global environmental crisis to a supplementary teacher’s guide, the curriculum turns its back on the facts. Science, not industry cheerleading, is what is needed in the classroom.

In a ham-handed attempt to sway public opinion, the curriculum describes solar and wind power as “perceived” renewable energy sources and says there is a “debate” about whether using renewable sources is better for the environment. Instead of contemplating a gradual shift to renewable energy, the curriculum describes the ending of nonrenewable energy as “devastating to us socially as well as economically.”

The engaging, classroom-ready curriculum that meets the standards set by the State Board of Education might be an attractive option for districts and teachers. A stipend further encourages educators to attend a workshop and teach the curriculum to others.

Educators and parents should be wary. Teachers do not usually have the resources, knowledge or time to balance industry-influenced material with differing points of view. If educators choose to rely on this material, they should take extra care to question the material’s sources, biases and completeness and seek supplemental information that highlights the environmental consequences of oil and gas.

This particular curriculum was funded chiefly with a federal grant, but it raises the disturbing question of what happens if what is taught in the classroom is decided in the marketplace and farmed out to those who can afford to pay for the development and dissemination of school materials.

This type of industry endeavor has the potential to find its way into many Texas classrooms and can be customized for other states. Since a middle school science teacher typically teaches 100 students, Texas Christian University, which is involved in workshop training for teachers, “would reach 27,500 middle school students in the first year with Texas Energy Education Project curriculum,” notes the web site for the Texas Energy Education Project.

It’s in our best interest as a state and a nation to produce scientists who can compete on a global stage. To be on the winning side of future debates, our students will need robust and complete scientific curricula, not industry playbooks.