Yale Climate Connections reports that students across the United States are hoping to enact the so-called Green New Steal … er … Deal in their schools. This as evidenced by Colorado’s Boulder Valley School District having assed a resolution with the assistance from district students tied to the Sunrise Movement climate cult. One student claimed (without evidence) other students in school districts across the nation are organizing to conduct similar campaigns.

It is good the district unanimously passed the resolution, but not for the reasons you may think. Four years ago, Oxford University’s St. John’s College had a similar scenario take place when some students wrote to Professor Andrew Parker to discuss their demands about the university divesting from fossil fuels.

According to The London Times:

Two students at St John’s College wrote to Andrew Parker, the principal bursar, this week requesting a meeting to discuss the protesters’ demands, which are that the college “declares a climate emergency and immediately divests from fossil fuels”. They say that the college, the richest in Oxford, has £8 million of its £551 million endowment fund invested in BP and Shell.

Professor Parker responded with a provocative offer: “I am not able to arrange any divestment at short notice,” he wrote. “But I can arrange for the gas central heating in college to be switched off with immediate effect. Please let me know if you support this proposal.

One of the students replied saying he would communicate the professor’s idea, but told Parker he didn’t think Parker was serious. Professor Parker responded saying:

You are right that I am being provocative but I am provoking some clear thinking, I hope. It is all too easy to request others to do things that carry no personal cost to yourself. The question is whether you and others are prepared to make personal sacrifices to achieve the goals of environmental improvement (which I support as a goal).

What was brilliant about the Professor’s move isn’t just his proposal, but the response he got from the students themselves. Quoting (again) from The Times:

Fergus Green, the organiser of the wider protest, who is studying for a master’s degree in physics and philosophy at Balliol College, said: “This is an inappropriate and flippant response by the bursar to what we were hoping would be a mature discussion. It’s January and it would be borderline dangerous to switch off the central heating.

When news of the incident was reported, some of the university’s donors were outraged, even to the point of some contributors (among them former Prime Minister Tony Blair) threatening to withhold donations. However, the Oxford professor put the focus of the divestment idea where it belonged. If care is not taken on how to proceed with policy proposals (like what the students advocate) a lot of people, especially the poor, will suffer and even die.

The best way for people to know if their ideas will actually work is to experience how they will affect proponents, like what citizens in California and the East Coast are experiencing with higher utility bills resulting from their states embracing renewable energy. The effects should be laid at the feet of their advocates in order to test their concepts with real world results. So, if Boulder Valley School District students want to fight climate change, the answer to them should be: you first.