Green | March 28, 2009 | 1 comment

Texas vote moves evolution to the top of the class

source: http://www.sciam.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=texas-vote-moves-evolution-to-the-t-...

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The Texas Board of Education voted today by a 13-to-2 margin to change controversial language in the state's curriculum, making it harder for creationism to creep into public classrooms. For the past 20 years, the state's curriculum has instructed teachers to present the "strengths and weaknesses" of scientific theories, opening the door to non-scientific, faith-based alternatives.

Today's vote strikes the old language and replaces it with instruction to "analyze, evaluate, and critique scientific explanations by using empirical evidence, logical reasoning and experimental and observational testing," according to Joshua Rosenau of the National Center for Science Education (NCSE), a pro-evolution non-profit based on Oakland, Calif. Other curriculum amendments proposed by social conservatives failed today, according to the Dallas Morning News, including two that called for biology classes to dissect the "sufficiency or insufficiency" of evidence for aspects of evolutionary theory.

Texas' curriculum can have a major impact on what's taught nationwide because it's such a big buyer of textbooks. "It's kind of like the Wal-Mart effect," says NCSE spokesperson Steven Newton. "If they won't carry your product, you modify your product so they will buy it." The Texas changes are set to take effect next year and remain in place until 2020.
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1 comment // Texas vote moves evolution to the top of the class

  • spoonieday
    • 0
      spoonieday  

    • I think this is horrible and slightly surprising to me because I attended religious schools in Texas and when the subject of how we got here, evolution was taught to us, even at otherwise conservative institutions. What the teachers said was, God exists and he created this really excellent process called evolution that would allow all the organisms on earth to grow and adapt to their changing circumstances, if they had to say anything at all about God (not all did). I'm not a christian anymore, but all the Christian parents didn't have a problem with their kids being taught about evolution because it is something that they need to know about, if for no other reason than it is taught at college, so it wouldn't come as a surprise when they took BIO 101 and no one made any mention of God.

      The whole discussion to me is disingenuous because Christians and other creationists don't get angry when teachers informing students about laws and rulings in our country don't teach the laws and rulings from the bible (or I guess maybe they do).

    • 4 years ago
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