High School Level Radiation Education Curriculum?

[David W Lee <lee_david_w@lanl.gov>]

Dear Radsafers:

        I am posting this summary of a message I received here at Los Alamos National Laboratory, from a non-RADSAFE member, in the hope that some RADSAFERS may have helpful expertise/knowledge regarding this issue.

        In the 1995-96 time frame, LANL was taken to court by a local Santa Fe-based anti-nuclear group called the Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety (CCNS)--a group heavily funded by Jane Fonda/Ted Turner.  The outcome of this case was that LANL signed a consent degree in January 1997.  The text of this consent decree apparently did NOT explicitly require LANL to develop a high school radiation education curriculum.  However, the CCNS lawyers now feel that LANL had an implied obligation to develop such a curriculum and make it available to local high schools, etc.

        Accordingly, the CCNS now wants the judge to rule in their favor (that LANL must develop such a curriculum) and further seeks to make the judge specify that any curriculum developed by LANL must use the radiation information from the NEWNET project.  COMMENT:  I do not know anything about the NEWNET project, but I suspect that since the CCNS is recommending it, that this project may contain either misleading or biased radiation information that is more closely aligned with CCNS's anti-nuclear viewpoint.

        Given the possibility that LANL may be told to develop a high-school level radiation education curriculum, do any RADSAFERS know of any such curricula currently in existence, endorsed or developed by say the Health Physics Society, the American Nuclear Society, DOE, or the American Science Teachers Association, etc., or any other reputable organization?  The thought is to possibly find an already developed curriculum and either modify it or piggyback information on it possibly to the point of having a module the would show local schools how to use the NEWNET data.  As you can surmise, LANL is trying to prepare itself to have to develop such a curriculum under court consent decree (worst case scenario), and should that turn out to be the case, LANL ought to do a quality job in developing an accurate, unbiased curriculum.

        The suggestions of any RADSAFER knowledgeable in this regard are sincerely solicited.  All replies to RADSAFE concerning this message will be forwarded to the LANL contacts concerned with this issue.  These contacts are Andy Andrews (andrews@lanl.gov) and Jean Dewart (dewart@lanl.gov).

        

Thank-you
in advance for your help.  Best regards  David

DAVID W. LEE
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Radiation Protection Services, ESH-12
X-Ray/Source Control Team Leader
PO Box 1663, MS K483
Los Alamos, NM  87545
PH:   (505) 667-8085
FAX:  (505) 667-9726
lee_david_w@lanl.gov