WHY THE WORLD NEEDS EARTH SCIENCE

The world is facing unprecedented challenges in the 21^st century. Energy, natural resources, global warming, climate change, and natural disasters are chief among them. All of these challenges can and must be met. Science and technology can provide the tools but we lack the political will. These challenges have one thing in common, that is they are all within the venue of earth science. Earth science is the meta-science that has the ability to investigate, understand, and pose solutions to these challenges. Earth Science has been abandoned by the public school system, higher education, and the public as a viable entity. Given all the challenges we face, how and why did this happen? It is clear that an iterative cycle has developed between K-12 schools and higher education that has acted to diminish the efficacy of Earth Science. A challenge needs to be issued to confront the lack of Earth Science in our classrooms. K-12 principals and superintendent as well as higher education administrators are the best equipped to affect change and make Earth Science a main line science.