[RSCT] Texas Faces A Major Battle over Evolution Instruction In The Public Schools

[S. Kashdan]

Lone Star Wars

Texas Faces A Major Battle over Evolution Instruction In The Public Schools

By Sandhya Bathija

Church & State Magazine, December 2008

http://www.au.org/site/R?i=x_4qTzEDAmlqsY-e1iZcdg..

After teaching in Texas public schools for 10 years and serving as a 
director of science curriculum for the Texas Education Agency for nearly 10 
years, Chris Castillo Comer's career as an educator took a turn she never 
expected, simply with a click of her computer's mouse.

She hit "send" on an e-mail announcing a lecture in Austin, Texas, to be 
given by Barbara Forrest, a professor at Southeastern Louisiana University 
and co-author of Creationism's Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent 
Design. Forrest's 2004 book exposed the theocratic agenda of the Discovery 
Institute and other creationist organizations.

Comer said she didn't know of Forrest until she received the e-mail 
announcement from the National Center for Science Education.

"I did a Google search on Barbara after I received the e-mail and I realized 
she had incredible credentials," Comer said. "I thought maybe some people 
may be interested in the lecture, so I forwarded the e-mail with an FYI 
subject heading to colleagues living in the Austin area."

Soon after, Comer was called in by a high-level boss and was told she had to 
immediately issue a disclaimer that stated her forwarded e-mail did not 
reflect the opinion of anyone from the Texas Education Agency, the 
administrative arm of the Texas State Board of Education. Comer was then 
asked to resign or she would be fired.

"When I sent the disclaimer e-mail, I was thinking, 'why wouldn't this be 
the opinion of the agency? The lecture is about evolution, and evolution is 
part of our standards,'" Comer said. "I now realize how naïve I was.

"I thought it was my job to advise on science, but I realized now my 
curriculum position was being marginalized by those in power," she said.

Comer's name has now become associated with what can happen if teachers 
don't follow what the school board -- and the Religious Right -- has in mind 
for the state of Texas.

"I think a tone has been set," Comer said. "Science educators are very 
worried, and many of my friends told me they have been called into meetings 
and told, 'Remember what happened to Chris Comer? Do not do any workshops on 
evolution or answer any questions on evolution.'"

Comer's story paints a picture of the climate permeating Texas -- a mood 
that has always lingered in the state but has escalated in the past eight 
years since Gov. Rick Perry entered office, Comer said. Perry has been a 
long-time friend of the Religious Right, and during his re-election in 2006, 
right-wing activists put forth the Texas Restoration Project to register and 
mobilize "values voters" to ensure Perry's re-election.

"I always thought those in charge thought of doing things that were best for 
the children," Comer said. "I realize now that they base it all on 
politics."

And the Texas public school system is the current battleground for the 
fundamentalist Christians seeking control of the state's public school 
system. They are trying to ward off scientists and continue to advance 
"intelligent design," the latest variant of creationism. Scientists and 
civil liberties activists, including Americans United for Separation of 
Church and State, are doing all they can to put up a fight.

In the upcoming months, the Texas State Board of Education will vote on 
whether the science curriculum, which is reviewed and updated every 10 
years, should continue to require students to learn the "strengths and 
weaknesses" of evolution in science classes.

To scientists, there are no weaknesses to evolution, and this terminology is 
merely code language to push non-scientific, religious viewpoints in public 
schools.

More than 800 Texas scientists have joined the 21st Century Science 
Coalition, a group organized to defend sound science education. Coalition 
leaders brought scientific journals with them to testify at the Texas 
Education Agency in October as proof that "weaknesses" in evolution don't 
exist.

"Not a single one [of the articles in these journals] gives us reason to 
believe evolution did not occur," Dan Bolnick, an assistant professor of 
integrative biology at the University of Texas told the Austin 
AmericanStatesman. "So where are the weaknesses? Simple: They don't exist. 
They are not based on scientific research or data and have been refuted 
countless times."

Americans United has drafted a letter to Board Chairman Don McLeroy and 
Texas Education Commissioner Robert Scott, both appointed by Perry, urging 
them to respect sound science standards and not interject religion into 
Texas' public schools.

"Public schools should educate, not indoctrinate," said Americans United 
Executive Director Barry W. Lynn. "The board should not risk the sound 
scientific education of Texas's children or costly litigation that could 
result from adopting any standards that would include creationism or 
intelligent design."

Americans United is working alongside the Texas Freedom Network (TFN), a 
Texas-based watchdog group that monitors the Religious Right, to oppose 
science standards intended to advance religious dogma.

The groups have alerted teachers, scientists, professors, clergy and any 
other Texans who might want to testify at the board's November and January 
hearings. TFN lined up 120 Texans to testify to their support for sound 
science standards at the November meeting.

Among those is the Rev. Dr. Charles Kutz-Marks, senior pastor of University 
Christian Church in Austin, who thinks religion should not be brought into 
science class.

"It is a misuse of religion, whether we are talking about Christianity or 
any other, to replace science in the operation of the world," Kutz-Marks 
said. "These politicians are very clearly working off a religious agenda to 
get creationism into our schools. And I think we are doing our children a 
great disservice if we don't teach them what a huge majority of scientists 
believe.

"I'm hopeful they will recognize this in order to serve the interests of our 
children," he continued, "we should be teaching them what the rest of the 
civilized world believes in."

Kutz-Marks is among many clergy in Texas who support teaching evolution in 
the science curriculum. The Texas Faith Network, a coalition of mainstream 
religious leaders from around the state, is working to correct the 
misconception that those who support evolution are anti-God.

In February, the coalition partnered with the Clergy Letter Project to 
promote Evolution Weekend, where clergy in all 50 states and nine countries 
delivered sermons, led discussions and hosted speakers, encouraging their 
congregations to recognize the distinctions between faith and science.

But despite this support for evolution, battling the right-wing faction of 
the Texas State Board of Education is not an easy task. The board is stacked 
with conservatives eager to carry out the agenda of their Religious Right 
constituency.

And the outcome won't be confined within the border of the Lone Star State. 
Texas is the second-largest purchaser of textbooks, after California, 
meaning publishers create books based on the needs of Texas schools. The 
curriculum decision in Texas will filter through to textbooks in other 
states.

At the helm of the 15-member board is McLeroy, a Bryan-College Station 
dentist who has made it clear he does not believe in evolution.

"I look at evolution as still a hypothesis with weaknesses," he told the 
Associated Press in early October.

McLeroy, an evangelical Christian, told the San Antonio Express-News in May 
that "evolution is not fact. Evolution is a theory and, as such, cannot be 
proven."

But McLeroy refutes the idea that his support of the "strengths and 
weaknesses" language is simply a way to force creationism on public school 
children.

"I'm getting sick and tired of people saying we're interjecting religion," 
McLeroy told the Associated Press. "We're certainly not interjecting 
religion. Not at all."

Texas scientists, teachers and civil rights activists don't buy into 
McLeroy's defense. According to reports by TFN and Texas Citizens for 
Science, the board's composition (seven of the 15 elected members are 
reportedly aligned with the creationists), along with its secretive 
activities, call McLeroy's and his allies' agenda into question.

The board's Religious Right mindset is apparent. Four members, Terri Leo, 
Cynthia Dunbar, Barbara Cargill and Gail Lowe, recently advocated for 
schools to use the National Council on Bible Curriculum in Public Schools' 
discredited and unconstitutional proselytizing materials.

Dunbar, a law graduate of TV preacher Pat Robertson's Regent University, 
recently posted a column on the Christian Worldview Network Web site 
attacking President-elect Barack Obama and predicting that with Obama as 
president, there will be a terrorist attack on America "by those with whom 
Obama truly sympathizes to take down the America that is a threat to 
tyranny." She continued by saying Obama will use that attack to declare 
martial law and expand his powers.

The author of a new book One Nation Under God, Dunbar says on her Web site, 
"Many, if not most, Americans fail to realize the socialistic, and even 
communistic world views they possess, because these views have become so 
inculcated into every area of our society, we no longer recognize them."

Despite the controversial views of some of its members, the board nominated 
a working group of teachers and scientists to draft a new science 
curriculum. An unofficial draft of these rules was reviewed by TFN 
activists, who were pleasantly surprised to find the controversial 
"strengths and weaknesses" language removed. TFN commended the working group 
in September for crafting "solid standards."

"These common-sense standards respect the right of families to pass on their 
own religious beliefs to their children while ensuring that public schools 
give students a sound science education that prepares them to succeed in 
college and the jobs of the future," said Kathy Miller, TFN president.

The board then made an announcement, however, that it would appoint a panel 
of "experts" to review the proposed curriculum and provide recommendations. 
Board members nominated three creationists to the six-member panel, and two 
of those creationists were not even from Texas.

TFN reported that several respected scientists had contacted state board 
members to serve on the review panel, but did not receive nominations.

"Texas universities boast some of the leading scientists in the world," said 
Miller. "It's appalling that some state board members turned to out-of-state 
ideologues to decide whether Texas kids get a 21st-century science 
education."

These "out-of state ideologues" include Stephen Meyer, vice president of the 
Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based think tank that actively promotes 
intelligent-design creationism. The other nominees were Ralph Seelke, 
co-author with Meyer of the anti-evolution textbook Explore Evolution, and 
Charles Garner, a professor in Baylor University's chemistry department with 
creationist sympathies.

According to a report by Steven Schafersman, president of Texas Citizens for 
Science, neither Meyer nor Seelke have the scientific qualifications to sit 
on the panel and Garner is "marginally qualified."

"Meyer is not a professional scientist, but a polemicist and 
pseudoscientific activist who specializes in writing persuasive essays that 
promote IDC [intelligent-design creationism] for Discovery Institute 
marketing campaigns," Schafersman wrote. The Discovery Institute has a 
variety of tactics to push "intelligent design" concepts into public 
schools, but a federal court in Pennsylvania struck down promotion of 
religion in science classes in its Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School ruling.

While Seelke is a professor of biology at the University of 
Wisconsin-Superior, his official university Web site offers a disclaimer. 
"The contents of these pages do not necessarily reflect the views of 
UW-Superior and are not officially endorsed by the university," it says. His 
posted writings question evolution and promote "intelligent design."

The "expert" panel provided its recommendations to the board in early 
November, with the anti-evolution members advocating for the "strengths and 
weaknesses" language while the panel's other members recommended the draft 
proposals stay as they are, with "strengths and weaknesses" removed.

More recently, a new -- but no less insidious -- term, "strength and 
limitations," suddenly appeared in the draft curriculum. Sources say a 
creationist member of the working group managed to get the words included, 
and as Church & State went to press, a wrangle over the move was under way.

The proposed rules are available for public comment, and several Americans 
United members in Texas are expressing their wishes for how the board should 
vote.

"Religion is being used here as a tool of control instead of for personal 
development," said Eric Lane, president of the San Antonio AU Chapter. 
"People in the Religious Right want to shut down critical thinking; it's 
extremely selfish.

"Texas is moving backwards," he continued, "and people want to take us 
backwards because of fear."

Despite the pleas from clergy, educators, scientists and civil liberties 
activists in Texas, Comer knows the reality of what they are up against.

"I've sat down with a lot of reporters to do interviews, and they always are 
telling me the majority of Texans don't believe in evolution so why should 
it be taught in public schools," she said. "These are educated people with 
college degrees saying things like this."

The anti-evolution movement has a long history in Texas. In the mid-1990s, 
former Gov. George W. Bush signed Texas Proclamation 95, requiring basic 
biology textbooks to "formulate, discuss, critique, and review hypotheses, 
theories, laws, and principles, and their strengths and weaknesses."

Following Bush's lead, Religious Right activists began to turn the State 
Board of Education into a battleground, according to a report by Texas 
Weekly. Voters began to elect "a board with a bloc of ideologues who care 
more about promoting their own personal agendas than educating Texas kids," 
Dan Quinn, communications director for TFN, told Texas Weekly.

In 1997, the word "evolution" was added to Texas biology standards for the 
first time, according to a Texas Citizens for Science report. Many of the 
Texas Education Agency administrators didn't want to do it, fearing 
objections from the state board.

As a compromise, the board added a Biology Textbook Proclamation that stated 
evolutionary explanations in biology texts would be required to include 
"weaknesses." It then expanded this rule across every scientific discipline 
in the curriculum.

In addition to the "strengths and weaknesses" language, according to 
Schafersman, the current science curriculum refers to evolution as merely a 
"theory," while other science concepts such as cell biology, genetics, 
taxonomy, molecular biology or ecology are not referred to as "theories." 
Schafersman also finds fault that Texas does not require high school biology 
classes to teach human evolution.

"I just don't get it," Comer said. "How did we get to this point?"

Since her forced resignation, Comer has been following the Religious Right 
and educating herself about what she and other sound-science advocates in 
Texas are up against. She won't be testifying at the state board hearings, 
because she has a lawsuit pending against the state over her ouster.

"They feel if they don't believe what the Bible says, they aren't going to 
heaven," she said. "We may lose this one, because though they may be a small 
faction, they seem to be ruling the Republican Party and are making 
decisions that most intelligent people reject. It just puts Texas up for 
ridicule."