This article documents the emergence of environmental education in the curriculum discourse in Aotearoa/New Zealand in 1988, and proceeds to trace its path through a succession of curriculum documents over the subsequent two decades. As well as exploring the form environmental education takes in these documents, the way it emerges in educational priorities is also reviewed. This historical analysis highlights the political nature of the school curriculum in general, and in particular, the place of environmental education within it. It also suggests that the curriculum, by itself, provides little concrete guidance for teachers. In response, I propose that educators must look to their own community for strength and leadership in a hostile political climate.