Susan
------------
Kansas Battle Over Evolution In Schools Lingers On
By Carey Gillam
OVERLAND PARK, Kan. (Reuters) - A month has passed since the Kansas Board of
Education voted to remove evolution as a key concept in the state's science
curriculum, but the issue still touches raw nerves for people on both sides
of the debate.
The Kansas Board of Education on Aug. 11 voted 6-4 to embrace new standards
for science teaching in public schools that eliminate evolution as an
underlying principle of biology and other sciences.
``This issue is not going away,'' said board member William Wagnon, one of
the four who voted against the new science standards. ``It is a live issue.
The long-term consequences of this are phenomenal. If not corrected, it will
undermine a very fine public education system.''
Kansas Board of Education Chairwoman Linda Holloway, who voted in favor of
eliminating evolution teaching, said she stopped reading her e-mails after
hundreds of what she described as insult-laden messages from around the
country filled her home computer. She said her husband was worried about
threats of violence.
If not for the board's action rewriting the state's science standards,
evolution would be given too much credence in the classroom, Holloway said.
``I would do it again,'' she added.
With children settling in for the new school year in communities across
Kansas, many of the state's school district leaders and teachers have
pledged to continue to teach evolution as they have in the past.
The Kansas science curriculum standards set out guidelines for instruction
and dictate what will appear on state tests. But decisions about day-to-day
instruction remain in local hands.
Some districts are mulling changes. The district in Pratt, Kansas, for
instance, is considering including a book questioning evolution's validity
in supplemental reading for science classes. Pratt district superintendent
Ken Kennedy said a group of parents proposed the book, adding that the
timing of the move was merely coincidental to the board vote.
Some state legislators are calling for a law mandating the teaching of
evolution, as well as a measure that would reduce the power of the state's
board of education. A group of moderate Republicans have also announced
plans to target fellow Republican Holloway for defeat in elections next year.
Additionally, the chancellor of the University of Kansas last week announced
the formation of a task force on scientific literacy in education.
The theory of evolution holds that over millions of years humans and other
life forms evolved from earlier life forms.
Religious conservatives in Kansas and elsewhere are looking anew at science
instruction in their local schools and dissecting the ways in which
evolution instruction does or does not align with what they see as church
teachings about the creation of man and the universe.
Mary Kay Culp, an official with the Kansas Catholic Conference, said she was
pleased with the de-emphasis of evolution, but said the new standards did
not go far enough in purging evolution teaching from classrooms.
On the other side of the issue, the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas
and Western Missouri has mailed letters to every school district in Kansas
threatening legal action at the first hint of unconstitutional religious
intrusion into public schools.
Earlier this week, two community organizations made moves at finding a
middle ground. At their invitation, National Center for Science Education
Executive Director Eugenie Scott discussed evolution and creationism in
presentations held in a Lawrence, Kansas, church and a Jewish community
center in Overland Park, Kansas.
Scott said people did not necessarily have to choose between evolution and
creationism.
``Many people think that evolution is the way God brought about life,'' she
said.
But Scott argued that downplaying evolution in the state's science
curriculum standards was wrong.
``I'm sure in school districts around the state, less evolution will be
taught, and that will be a disservice to students when they go on to
college,'' Scott said.
--------
Peace is not the absence of conflict--it is the presence of justice.
--Martin Luther King, Jr.
Please visit my website:
http://www.telepath.com/susanb