Faux news before it hit big time politics (Amelia Frahm)

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Nuclear Literacy: Alternative Facts and Lessons Learned Authoring a Children’s Book

By Amelia Frahm

Who would want to censor a children’s picture book about nuclear power plants?

Read on…..

Fake news and phony experts: if you are associated the with the nuclear power industry you have encountered the chain reaction caused by alternative facts long before the 2016 presidential race made it headline news.

The fake phenomena didn’t just begin after we grew up and got a job in the nuclear industry; this type of behavior has been happening for decades on elementary playgrounds across the country.

If the popular kid with the big mouth said your breath smelled like poop, well it might as well have stunk. If even one peer got close enough to smell the truth, and continued to save you a seat at the lunch table, you were lucky. The rest of the class would be found repeating and embellishing the lie in an effort to win the coveted lunch table seat next to the popular kid.

It seems like every day there is an adult version of this scenario played out on social media.

My belief used to be that most children would mature into adults who would want to get to know a person or educate themselves about a situation before passing along a Page 1

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judgement. That belief was shattered in 2011 with the release of my children’s book Nuclear Power: How a Nuclear Power Plant Really Works!

The book was intended as a resource to explain the basic operation of a nuclear power plant. Anyone who has read it knows that it provides children the opportunity to learn about nuclear power plants in a format that is neither pro nor con. It’s not scary. It’s just a creative spin on the well-worn How a Nuclear Power Plant Works brochure.

I had worked in the nuclear industry during the 1980’s, after the Three Mile Island incident and during the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

In the aftermath of Fukushima I knew a children’s book about nuclear power plants would not be perceived as a warm, fuzzy bedtime story. However, if ever there was a time that children might need an explanation about how a nuclear power plant operates, I thought post-Fukushima would be it.

Not many writers get published without experiencing rejection first, and I was no exception. My personal and professional life had been entwined with the highs, the lows, and the nausea that had accompanied pioneering a children’s book about cancer during an era when talking to children about cancer was still taboo.

Even so, I was unprepared for the social media backlash both my nuclear power book and my character received via social media.

My book was called nuclear propaganda for children. I was called everything from morally bankrupt to an unfit mother, and one person went so far as to call me a nuclear pedophile. (Celebrity model turned anti-nuclear activist, Christie Brinkley, was the popular kid some of my detractors were trying to impress.)

Most perturbing was that my attackers had never read my book. I knew this not only from their comments, but because at that time, the only way to obtain a copy of the book was from me. I had a list of all the professional reviewers I had sent a copy to and any customers who had purchased one. Neither I nor my bank account recognized the names of my critics.

However, anyone believing the fake news stories circulating social media at the time would have told you my bank account was chock-full of money I had received from the nuclear industry as payoff for writing their propaganda. It’s probably the one thing written about me that left me laughing hysterically as opposed to wanting to cry or throw up.

The financially poor truth was it had been another lifetime ago since I had worked in the nuclear industry. Even back when I did, I usually felt like that kid on the playground whose breath stank. Being a creative-type amongst a bunch of nuclear engineering Page 2

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brains is what eventually led me to write a children’s book about nuclear power plants. I hoped to pique the interest of children like myself, who were not technically inclined and fell asleep when reading the how-does-it-work brochure about nuclear power plants.

I would have been happy to obtain a degree in science, technology, engineering or math—my job prospects would have been much better—but you don’t usually excel at something you’re just not interested in.

Consequently, my very first professional job embraced everything pertaining to science, technology, engineering and math! After graduating from the University of Florida with a public relations/journalism degree—something I was interested in—I landed a job at the South Texas Project (STP), a nuclear power plant which was under construction in Matagorda County, Texas.

One of my assignments was to create and implement a program for sixth grade students about the fundamentals of how the STP nuclear power plant would work. Another was to explain to Texans in close proximity to the power plant that it was a safe, reliable, clean energy source that would provide job opportunities that young men and women wouldn’t have to leave home to pursue.

Judging from the heartwarming way I was treated when I returned to the area for a book signing event more than two decades later, we were successful.

However even in predominantly pro-nuclear Matagorda County, where every resident knows someone that works at the local nuclear power plant you could sense apprehension.

Within hours of my book signing event I had learned two things: 1. Children living next door to the nuclear power plant didn’t necessarily know what it was for.

2. Education and experience were not as significant as TV appearances when it came to being perceived as an expert.

I arrived in Matagorda not long after the Fukushima disaster. The majority of people who attended my book signing event were employees of the South Texas Project Electric Generating Station. None of them had any doubts that STP was safe. Their concern was that due to all the publicity surrounding Fukushima, friends and relatives didn’t believe them when they said it was.

One nuclear professional shared a story about his mother who had been worried for his safety after listening to someone on TV talk about nuclear power. When he pointed out to her that some of what she heard was inaccurate, she pointed out the man wouldn’t be Page 3

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on TV if he wasn’t an expert.

To which he had replied that due to his job and the nuclear engineering degree she helped pay for, many people considered him an expert.

Another employee shared how she had just assumed her elementary-aged son knew that she worked at a nuclear power plant which made electricity. She was floored when, after reading my book, he expressed surprise that she worked at a nuclear plant like the one in the story. They lived in an area surrounded by farms and, like most employees; she referred to the South Texas Project Electric Generating Station as simply “the plant”.

Her young son had studied all about plants in school—just not power plants. He had thought his mom worked at a greenhouse.

While these examples make amusing anecdotes, it is more disturbing than humorous that on today’s social media playground fake news stories are always more interesting than the boring truth. Even adults who should know better are swayed by less educated, inexperienced, phony experts.

Sadly the very credentials that make one knowledgeable about nuclear power are pointed to with disdain and looked upon with suspicion. Real experts are accused of having their own agenda and we have entered an era where science itself is at risk for being censored in exchange for alternative facts.

Most disturbing of all is that it is leaving our children susceptible to the kid on the playground with the biggest mouth.

Even seemingly educated adults who should know better are susceptible to fake news and phony experts, and we have only ourselves to blame.

Despite social media, most of us live in our own secluded bubbles where it is easy to disengage from anyone whose opinion differs from our own.

The very same children’s book that provoked the wrath of anti-nuclear activists almost didn’t get published because, prior to Fukushima, even people in the nuclear industry were not all that interested.

The consensus was that our post–Three Mile Island safety record was unsurpassed, and nuclear literacy for elementary children was an unnecessary expense.

Perhaps the industry thought that schools would educate our children, but I soon discovered that the No Child Left Behind mandate had left behind nuclear literacy.

The elementary school programs that had been such an important element of the community, and the public relations campaigns that I had helped perform in the 1980’s Page 4

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were cut back or halted altogether. Visitor information centers (if they existed), were only open to the public by appointment.

Most people outside of the nuclear industry tried to stifle their yawns when I mentioned nuclear power. If they knew anything about it at all, it was that nuclear power should be feared.

At the conclusion of a cancer awareness event where I was a guest speaker, I had mentioned my upcoming children’s book about nuclear power. One of the first questions I received was from an Ivy League–educated doctor (MD) who asked if I didn’t think there was a chance my cancer had been derived from working at the nuclear power plant. The South Texas Project had not even been operational when I was there, or my audience might have been a little less inclined to believe me when I said, no. After all, he was a doctor!

He was an intelligent man and his question was sincere, but like a lot of people who work within a highly skilled industry he lived within his own bubble. The only thing he knew about nuclear power plants was what he saw on TV or the internet. An excellent safety record doesn’t receive the same play time as bad news, fake news events, or a photo taken out of context.

Here’s a comment I received on my FB page after publishing my children’s book:

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The time to explain the attributes of nuclear power plants is before a catastrophic event, as we now know due to Fukushima. To do so afterwards is often futile as the credentials that make one more knowledgeable about nuclear power plants are looked upon with suspicion.

Despite the lessons learned from the Fukushima disaster, nuclear literacy in the form of a children’s picture book continues to be a tough sell.

Nothing I’ve written has ever been published without first being read and critiqued by both children’s book professionals and experts within the field of my topic, and that included Nuclear Power: How a Nuclear Power Plant Really Works!

Merging a creative children’s book format with the technicalities of how a nuclear power plant operates was not an easy task. The book took me years to develop, was scrutinized by peer reviewers in the publishing industry, and was then sent to professionals with varying degrees of expertise in the nuclear field.

There was one period of self-doubt when I was asked—once again—why the characters in the book couldn’t be human. My daughter told me to remember that I was the expert on children’s picture books and capturing the young reader’s attention.

After spending several summers at the Shearon Harris nuclear plant, in North Carolina, being critiqued by members of my target market audience (i.e. elementary students and teachers attending the Wake County science camp), I concluded that my daughter was right.

Prior to publication, I—like most authors—sought and was thrilled to receive several wonderful reviews from legitimate and well-respected book industry critics. Unknown to most lay people, legitimate book reviewers/critics don’t review every book, and it’s a big deal if they choose yours. Several renowned nuclear power experts critiqued the book and wrote recommendations. The book received endorsements from respected nuclear literacy advocates, a Notable Books citation from the Independent Publisher, and a Mom’s Choice Award.

You would never guess all that by reading the reviews of Nuclear Power: How a Nuclear Power Plant Really Works! on Amazon, Goodreads, or my (now defunct) social media page.

I’m well aware that my “nuke book” is not a real science text book, but the illustrations are great, the editor knew her stuff, and if an alternative fact story is not your thing, there is a schematic and glossary in the back of the book.

Best of all, the book does exactly what it was meant to do: pique a child’s curiosity and provoke a discussion about nuclear power… between just about anybody!

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The best reviews I have received have not come from social media, but from children.

Children are honest, inquisitive, and genuine, and school visits are the best part about being a children’s book author.

One of my favorite reviews came from a reporter’s daughter. While interviewing me, the reporter casually mentioned that her third-grade daughter said reading my book made her feel smart! Her comment made me feel smart!

Several months after my book signing event I returned to Matagorda to present my nuclear power school presentation. Almost every school in Matagorda County had signed up, and not just children, but parents as well were in attendance.

In the 1980’s when I was first tasked with implementing a nuclear school program, one of the things I noted was that parents would use their children as an excuse to ask their own questions. This is still true today.

What we all need to remember is that when you teach a young child a lesson plan or give them a picture book, the parent learns something as well.

When I wrote my book, my intent was to capture the attention of the student who did not grasp the technical fundamentals of a nuclear power plant as easily as their scientific minded classmates. When I present my program I strive to challenge the smart child, and to make the challenged child feel smart—not to humiliate anyone.

It is my hope that, by using this approach to educate our elementary students, they will grow up to be adults less inclined to humiliate or demean others via social media or any way else.

Disagreeing about an issue is not a reason to censor the topic, but rather the reason it should be studied. Our children need to know that you can disagree about a topic and still be friends.

As the author of a children’s book about nuclear power, I know what it feels like to be the kid with the stinky breath, sitting alone in the school cafeteria.

On more than one occasion, a smile has faded from the face of a potential friend or associate in the writing community upon discovering that the topic of my latest picture book was nuclear power plants.

Their demeanor is not unlike the reception I have received from a few people within the nuclear industry regarding my “silly” book.

I’m forever grateful to the learned experts and superheroes within the nuclear communications community and beyond, who understand the benefits of nuclear literacy and public relations and have helped me stand up to the bullies on the social Page 7

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media playground.

End Amelia Frahm is known for taking contentious, difficult topics and putting them in a format children will find interesting and adults will argue about. She’s the author of the award-winning children’s picture books Nuclear Power: How a Nuclear Power Plant Really Works! and Tickles Tabitha’s Cancer-tankerous Mommy. She’s also creator of Crack Open a Book! which provided the first cancer education school program curriculum written and taught by a cancer survivor. Visit NutcrackerPublishing.com for more information or visit her at http://ameliafrahm.blogspot.com/ Her books are available at Amazon and on Kindle.

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