Have you quizzed your child yet on the supposedly benign value of ethanol? Believe it or not, some students at and above the third grade might have a thing or two to say about it after being subjected to “Ethanol in the Classroom,” an education (read: indoctrination) platform created by the Renewable Fuels Association.

The organization’s president, Bob Dinneen, recently described this e-learning tool as “providing a fun and interactive way for students to learn about the renewable fuel.” He further heralded it as “a fun platform for children and young adults to learn about ethanol’s numerous benefits.”

There are countless words that accurately describe ethanol, but beneficial is most assuredly not one of them. According to the Department of Energy, the U.S. produced 14.54 billion bushels of corn in 2016. Of that, 5.25 billion — or 36% — was used for ethanol. Which means that only 64% of corn is being used to feed the hungry; the rest is being wasted on a biofuel that ruins your lawnmower and other gasoline-powered tools and automobiles.

Our own Mark Alexander has chronicled numerous other problems associated with ethanol.


Here’s another fact — one that truly worries the mandate’s most vociferous advocates: The detrimental effect of ethanol isn’t a secret. Just how deficient is it? The Washington Times recently reported that “the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) that boosted ethanol use has fallen out of favor so badly that environmentalists now see themselves on the same side of the debate as Republicans such as Sen. Ted Cruz, arguing that the entire program is deeply flawed and must be completely overhauled.”

As Hot Air blogger Jazz Shaw says of “Ethanol in the Classroom,” “I don’t need to sit through the class to be able to guess that a few things were left out of the curriculum.” He adds, “This isn’t an education program. It’s an indoctrination scheme. Get ‘em while they’re young and you can influence their actions and choices as adults.”

The biofuel mandate is clearly on shaky ground. And the activists’ solution is to use children as pawns to save it — much like the gun control lobby is doing to an astonishing degree after the Parkland, Florida, school shooting. All told, it’s more proof that education standards need to be controlled at the local level.

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