Corporate Teaching Aid Gets Low Marks -- Procter & Gamble Text Says Clear Cutting OK For Environment

NEW YORK - It seemed like corporate philanthropy to thousands of money-starved public schools: free teaching kits with lessons on environmentalism, a subject many students embrace.

But the curriculum, funded by Procter & Gamble Co., is drawing bad marks from some environmentalists who say it contains misinformation designed to further the interests of the leading consumer products company.

Among the lessons: timber clear-cutting stimulates growth and feeds animals, disposable diapers are as environmentally sound as cloth, and incineration is like recycling.

Critics have asked attorneys general in 11 states to investigate the kits.

Those disputing parts of the curriculum include several members of an advisory panel that reviewed it. They said P&G ignored some of their advice.

Cincinnati-based P&G owns leading household product brands ranging from Crest toothpaste to Scope mouthwash to Tide detergent. Its Pampers and Luvs dominate the disposable diaper market.

The company denied suggestions it has tried to mislead teachers and students. It said the "Decision: Earth" kit builds critical thinking skills and taps experience dating to 1912, when students used Crisco oil lessons to learn cooking.

Procter & Gamble defense

"Clearly in this case we don't believe it's marketing materials and don't believe there's any inherent conflict with existing regulatory guidelines," P&G spokesman Scott Stewart said.

In recent years, businesses have intensified their presence in public schools. Whittle Communications of Knoxville, Tenn., has aroused a major debate by giving schools free TV gear if they show its regular program of news and ads.

Schools themselves have appealed for corporate help because of budget problems. Businesses also are drawn by youthful consumer buying power, which has doubled since the mid-1980s.

"Schools are just about broke, so they welcome bona fide teaching assistance," said James McNeal, a Texas A&M University professor specializing in children's marketing.

Stewart said the P&G material is popular with teachers and that some concerns may stem from outdated information, though there are no immediate plans to revise it.

Distributed to 70,000 teachers via mail and conventions for the past two years, the material introduces the "life-cycle" of consumer goods, or their environmental impact from manufacture to disposal.

"Clear cutting removes all trees within a stand of a few species to create new habitat for wildlife," one passage asserts. "Procter & Gamble uses this economically and environmentally sound method because it most closely mimics nature's own processes."

Clear cutting claims

Most environmental experts say any ecological benefits to clear-cutting, which denudes swaths of forest, are overshadowed by erosion, loss of wildlife habitat and the replacement of diverse vegetation with single-species tree "farms." The P&G material doesn't mention this.

Thomas Shimalla, assistant director of the Pocono Environmental Educational Center in Dingmans Ferry, Pa., and one of six people on the P&G advisory panel, said he didn't remember the clear-cutting depiction and expressed surprise upon hearing it.

"I don't think I would have let something like that slip by," he said.

Panel member Anthea Maton, a curriculum consultant in Oklahoma City, said she had told P&G the passage was inaccurate.

"I was surprised when I saw that in there, and I put a little note in there saying this was not necessarily believed by many people," Maton said.

A science teacher who uses the P&G kit, Kathy Lynch of Glen-Este High School in Cincinnati, said she found sections on composting and other topics useful.

But Joan Borovatz, a science teacher at Santa Cruz High School in California, said she wouldn't use the kit, partly because of what she called its emphasis on consumerism.

"They leave out and they include statements I would not think would be included in any science program I ever did," she said.

Lance King of Californians Against Waste, a Sacramento-based environmental group, said he thought much of the curriculum favors P&G's interests.

"We believe these materials do end up constituting promotional materials, " King said.

One worksheet asks students to "calculate" the effects of disposable vs. cloth diapers using a study that examined emissions such as washing machine wastewater. Disposables score better in all five categories but one - "industrial and post-consumer solid waste."

Environmentalists say the worksheet is misleading because it doesn't explain that P&G paid for the study or mention another study financed by cloth diaper makers that concluded disposables are worse. P&G also does not mention it's the biggest maker of disposable diapers.

One member of the advisory panel reviewing the P&G materials said he had "red-marked" the diaper section but his suggestion was ignored.

"My concern was that I'm not sure that's correct. The landfill problem definitely is there," said Robert E. Roth, a professor and acting director of the School of Natural Resources at Ohio State University. Disposable diapers represent about 2 percent of landfill garbage.

Some educators use the material in ways P&G may not have intended. Teacher Gary Nunnelee, who runs an environmental club at Seattle's Shorewood High School, said the material helps students recognize subtle company promotions.

Shorewood 10th-grader Van Diep, 15, said that "by promoting their products now as safe and environmentally sound, it will create more consumers."