Photo: Screenshot from now-deleted video published by Woodside detailing their schools program that included drilling for “oil” between two pieces of white bread.

Alison Holt had been so busy that she didn’t initially think to ask for more detail when she was first told that she would be handing over her top-performing Year 10 science class to a presenter for an hour the next day. At the time Holt, now retired, was a science teacher with 30-years’ experience who was responsible for two classes of 32-students, high achieving students expected to head to university.

She was teaching at a high school south of Perth, Western Australia, alongside her husband Geoff, the union rep, and it was only a few hours before the third-party educational provider arrived that she learned they were associated with the Australian petroleum industry.

For one hour, three weeks in a row, the presenters would come to run practical demonstrations for her classes. One involved sucking chocolate milk through TimTam and KitCat biscuits to teach these high-achieving students about how different geological formations had different porosity. Others had the students imagine themselves a logistics manager tasked with getting gas extracted from the ground in Australia all the way to Japan.

“The kids didn’t even know what a logistics manager was,” Holt says.

Students who participated actively and performed well on a quiz could be chosen to undertake a free trip to a university careers day and participate in a simulation where a helicopter was plunged into water to replicate what would happen if the aircraft crashed on its way out to a rig.

The only mention of climate change came towards the end, when a presenter, Holt recalls, spoke about how gas is a transition fuel, renewables were unreliable and electric cars were heavy and problematic.

“It’s unethical,” Holt says. “That’s the bottom line. And it’s by stealth, isn’t it? There were no consent forms. They’re not letting parents or the children have a choice about whether they want to be party to this.

“It’s part and parcel of all the aspects of [Western Australia] because it’s coming at you from every single direction. Sport, now education—it’s everywhere, this complete takeover by the oil and gas industry. This is the state capture that we see around us.”

The existence of this specific program itself is no secret—variations of the long-running program have been delivered in Australian schools since the 90s and have been reported on in news media, but have largely continued on without opposition or oversight.

However, Australia climate campaign group CommsDeclare new report From Cradle to Career has found that these educational efforts are part of a multi-million-dollar effort by fossil fuel producers to deliver marketing material to children and young people. The report sought to quantify the scale of this activity across Australia as part of a collaborative effort with a range of organizations that used publicly available material to track programs targeting children in schools, sports clubs and museums.

The effort identified 282 programs for children aged 0-to-18 associated with oil, gas and coal producers. The bulk of these operated in Western Australia, with Queensland the next-most active state. Western Australia and Queensland are both major gas producers, with the latter also home to a large coal-mining industry.

A spokesperson for the WA Department of Education said it “partners with a range of organizations, particularly in regional Western Australia, to support students and deliver infrastructure upgrades to schools.”

“These organzsations can’t amend or influence school curriculum,” they said. “These partnerships or engagements don’t constitute rights to promote.”

A map produced by CommsDeclare visualizing the location of these programs across the country, showing that they are not evenly distributed.

Though complete funding data is unavailable, the report looked at six programs by BHP, Chevron, Glencore, Shell, BHP and Woodside and found a total of $54.53m (USD$37.52) had been spent in total to support sports, STEM and educational programs in schools across the country. Some of these initiatives extended outside Australia to neighboring Papua New Guinea, where operators have large-scale developments.

Industry involvement extended beyond class materials, programs and subject matter to financial support for programs designed to provide “professional development” for teachers as part of the mandatory requirement to maintain their qualification. One example cited by the group involved a professional development provider, a registered charity, that had publicly listed partnerships with several coal mining companies.

CommsDeclare co-founder Belinda Noble said there was “little accountability and transparency” over the issue and called for a senate inquiry into the matter, as it is currently impossible to know the full extent.

Noble compared efforts by fossil fuel companies to get into school to the promotion of tobacco, junk food and banking services in schools—all recognized forms of advertising which have been banned—saying that her organized believed children were being targeted to “delay climate action”.

“It could be described as ‘petro-grooming’,” Noble said. “Where are these children getting alternative points of view? When BHP is literally funding the education system, or Woodside is sponsoring your school, or Glencore’s bought your laptop, where are you getting the diverse views and options, let alone the partial climate information? Where are they getting their views and skills to succeed in a warming world?”

It is no secret that oil and gas companies operating in Australia have sought to cultivate influence and shape the developing minds of young people since the first discovery of oil in 1953.

When North American firms, Texaco and Standard Oil California, today known as Chevron, first arrived as part of the exploration effort, they brought with them their favored public relations firm: Hill&Knowlton.

Richard “Dick” Darrow, the same man who handled Hill&Knowlton’s US tobacco and oil industry accounts, would represent them on the ground in Australia. In March 1954, the firm outlined a marketing strategy to help improve the industry’s image that planned to use “school kits” developed by Standard Oil California, court universities, and encourage “community cooperation” programs.

These efforts continued on a company-by-company basis up through the decades until the early 1990s when the Australian Institute of Petroleum and Australian Petroleum Exploration Association, today known as Australian Energy Producers, partnered in a coordinated program targeting Australian schools.

The aim of this program was to “improve the public perception of the industry and the way in which it is portrayed within the education system” and the details were laid out in a 1994 paper presented at the national industry conference.

“By assisting the wider understanding of petroleum matters, the industry will enhance its own viability and ultimately its long-term survival,” it said. “An involvement in education can create familiarity and reach the people who have a stake in the industry’s future. Contributions to education identify a company as a good corporate citizen.”

An image of future Australia prime minister Tony Abbott at the launch of “The Big Book of Oil and Gas” produced by the oil industry at a Canberra High School in May/June 1997.

The advent of the internet dealt that program a blow, but variations have continued on since, with fossil fuel sponsorship of kids swimming programs, anthropomorphized coal mascots and sports clubs.

Associate Professor Eve Mayes from Deakin University who studies the sponsorship practices, teaching programs and production of school materials by fossil fuel companies, particularly where they talk about climate change, said there were “many questions” about the extent of corporate influence on young people in Australia. She said there had been a withdrawal of public funding for educational institutions that has often left them vulnerable to overtures from large corporate sponsors or philanthropic organizations where there is no clarity about who is provided the money, or a particular view about how it should be spent.

“I think it’s quite insidious, it’s an attempt to creep into settings where children and young people are learning and shape how they perceive companies that continue to produce fossil fuels,” Mayes said.

Of particular concern, Mayes said, was the power dynamic that is created when it comes to private philanthropy or corporate sponsorship as often the institution that is receiving the gift can feel obligated or loyal to the donor, and so becomes reluctant to criticize them.

“The big question in all this is who benefits? Who benefits from fossil fuel companies providing these resources, financially or otherwise in settings where children and young people play and learn?” she said. “And, is it in the best interests of children and young people to be supported through the resources of an industry with a commercial interest? Especially as young people will inherit this world.”