New Orleans Schools Reject Creationism

No Teacher ‘Shall Teach Any Aspect Of Religious Faith As Science’ 

By Zack Beauchamp on Dec 19, 2012 at 11:49 am

A Louisiana school district voted on Wednesday to ban from its schools any textbooks and school curricula that follows the guidelines of Texas’ extreme, ideological standards. 

Texas approved a hard-right curriculum in 2010 that taught utterly misleading assertions as fact — suggesting, for example, that Senator Joseph McCarthy’s anti-Communist witch hunt had been vindicated and that the Crusades didn’t happen. But Orleans Parish (which covers New Orleans) schools were so worried about the spread of misinformation that it approved explicit rules in protest of Texas’s guidelines, requiring teachers to teach accurate historical and scientific information which wouldn’t necessarily be conveyed under Texas rules: 

“No history textbook shall be approved which has been adjusted in accordance with the State of Texas revisionist guidelines nor shall any science textbook be approved which presents creationism or intelligent design as science or scientific theories…No teacher of any discipline of science shall teach any aspect of religious faith as science or in a science class,” it reads. “No teacher of any discipline of science shall teach creationism or intelligent design in classes designated as science classes.” 

Though Texas cannot legally require the teaching of creationism, Governor Rick Perry (R-TX) has said “we teach both creation and evolution our public schools” as a consequence of his policy choices. 

Two years ago, proposed Texas textbook changes sparked outrage by rewriting history along right-wing lines and minimizing slavery. While not fully successful, the watered-down version still conveyed an entirely skewed vision of history. A recent review of the books, for example, found a consistent pattern of viciously negative portrayals of Muslims and Islam. 

 UPDATE: 

A state law, the Louisiana Science Education Act, opens the door to teaching creationism in schools. The Orleans County vote was aimed to be a protest against this state law.

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Religious wingnut supports rewriting history

This is what is running for the Texas State Board of Education.

 

The social studies curriculum this loon supports with her own alternate version of history was roundly criticized even by the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute. The religious wingnuts are staging a hostile takeover of Texas public schools with the intent of indoctrinating the children with their false history and religious myths.

In a state where (1) a large percentage of rural, voting age citizens shun education in favor of just accepting what they are told, and (2) 51% identify themselves as "very conservative", and (3) straight party ticket voting is allowed, reason and intellectualism may well be driven somewhere north of the Red River.

I miss Ann Richards and Moly Ivins.

H/T

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Verbatim

TFN: April 25, 2011, by Jose

Publisher Proposes Creationist Materials

The Texas Education Agency has released proposed supplemental web-based materials for science courses from publishers who want their product in your child’s classroom as early as the 2011-2012 school year.

But there’s a problem with at least one of those publishers that represents a potential leap backward for science education in Texas.

International Databases, Inc., a previously unknown company apparently based in New Mexico, has submitted materials that make no attempt to hide a slant toward creationism and intelligent design, and away from established scientific fact.

Submissions by International Databases and other publishers can be reviewed at the Texas Education Agency website.

Below are a few examples of attacks on evolution and creationist statements in International Databases’ materials found during a preliminary review by TFN and the NCSE (click on each image to enlarge):

Module 1: Origin Nucleotide (slide 19)

Since such materialistic, self organization scenarios now have a history of scientific
insufficiency for explaining the Origin of Life on Earth, the Null hypothesis (default) stands.
This allows for the testing of the legitimate scientific hypothesis……Life on Earth is the
result of intelligent causes.

Module 8: Teacher Resources (Slide 3)

…at the end of the instructional unit on the Origins of Life, students should go home with
the understanding that a new paradigm of explaining life’s origins is emerging from the failed
attempts of naturalistic scenarios. This new way of thinking is predicated upon the
hypothesis that intelligent input is necessary for life’s origins.

Module 7: Null Hypothesis (Slide 7)

This module sets up two competing explanations for the origin of life: “Non-intelligent
Causes” vs. “Intelligent Causes.” The clear intent is to make a case for an intelligent
designer. The slide below tells students that “until advocates of non-intelligent causes
sustain their claim,” students must accept that life on earth is a result of intelligent causes.

Module 7: Scientific Method (Slide 6)

Many scientists have adopted an unproven hypothesis upon which to build their theories
regarding the origin of life and its’ diversification. This ‘foundation’ is called scientific
materialism, naturalism, and so forth… There are other scientists who have adopted the
unproven hypothesis that an intelligence is necessary to explain both the origin, and
diversification of life on Earth. This view follows from the human experience that teaches
order (complexity) results from intelligent action.

We’ll remind you that it was the SBOE that opened the door to a submission like International Databases’.

In 2009, the SBOE approved new science curriculum standards that call into question the established, mainstream science supporting evolution. At the time, TFN and NCSE warned that the new standards would encourage some vendors and groups to submit textbooks and other instructional materials promoting creationist claims and other pseudoscience in Texas science classrooms.

You have the opportunity to weigh in. Contact the SBOE by email atreview.adoption@tea.state.tx.us before the July meeting and tell them to stand up for science and reject creationist materials in public schools.