NCSE Evolution and Climate Education Update for 2014/02/28
Submitted by Peter Burns on Fri, 2014-02-28 16:48.
National Center for Science Education
(by NCSE Deputy Director Glenn Branch)
Dear friends of NCSE, A bill to repeal Louisiana's 2008 antievolution law is introduced. One antiscience bill is dead in Oklahoma. NCSE's Eugenie C. Scott receives a lifetime achievement award from CFI and CSI. A bill to repeal Louisiana's 1981 antievolution law is introduced. And a preview of New Trends in Earth-Science Outreach and Engagement -- featuring NCSE's Minda Berbeco and Mark McCaffrey.
REPEAL EFFORT REVIVED AGAIN IN LOUISIANA Senate Bill 175, prefiled in the Louisiana Senate on February 25, 2014, and provisionally referred to the Senate Committee on Education, would, if enacted, repeal Louisiana Revised Statutes 17:285.1, which implemented the so-called Louisiana Science Education Act, passed and enacted in 2008. Governor Bobby Jindal told NBC News in 2013 that the LSEA permits the teaching of creationism, including "intelligent design." The bill to repeal the LSEA was introduced by Karen Carter Peterson (D-District 5), who sponsored the identical SB 70 in 2011, SB 374 in 2012, and SB 26 in 2013. The Senate Committee on Education voted 5-1 to shelve SB 70 in 2011, 2-1 to shelve SB 374 in 2012, and 3-2 to shelve SB 26 in 2013. The law targeted for repeal calls on state and local education administrators to help to promote "critical thinking skills, logical analysis, and open and objective discussion of scientific theories being studied including, but not limited to, evolution, the origins of life, global warming, and human cloning"; these four topics were described as controversial in the original draft of the legislation. It also allows teachers to use "supplemental textbooks and other instructional materials to help students understand, analyze, critique, and review scientific theories in an objective manner" if so permitted by their local school boards. A sponsor of the billtold the Hammond Daily Star (April 6, 2008) that the bill was aimed at promoting the discussion of "scientific data related to creationism." Since 2008, antievolutionists have not only sought to undermine the law's provision allowing challenges to unsuitable supplementary materials but have also reportedly invoked the law to support proposals to teach creationism in at least two parishes -- Livingston and Tangipahoa -- and to attack the treatment of evolution in biology textbooks proposed for adoption by the state. Meanwhile, the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology urged Louisianans to repeal the law in 2008, and the Society of Integrative and Comparative Biology decided to hold its conferences elsewhere while the law remains on the books (relenting only in the case of New Orleans after the Orleans Parish School Board prohibited the teaching of creationism in its science classes). Endorsers of the repeal effort include a group of seventy-eight Nobel laureates in the sciences (representing nearly 40% of living Nobel laureates in the science), the National Association of Biology Teachers, the Louisiana Association of Biology Educators, the Louisiana Coalition for Science, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Institute for Biological Sciences, the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, the American Society for Cell Biology, the Society for the Study of Evolution together with the Society of Systematic Biologists and the American Society of Naturalists, the Clergy Letter Project, the New Orleans City Council, and the Baton Rouge Advocate. For the text of Louisiana's Senate Bill 175 as introduced (PDF), visit: http://www.legis.la.gov/legis/ViewDocument.aspx?d=875625&n=SB175%20Original And for NCSE's previous coverage of events in Louisiana, visit: http://ncse.com/news/louisiana ONE DOWN IN OKLAHOMA Oklahoma's Senate Bill 1765, which would, if enacted, have deprived administrators of the ability to prevent teachers from miseducating students about "scientific controversies," died in the Senate Education Committee on February 24, 2014, when a deadline for senate bills to pass committee expired. The sole senate sponsor of SB 1765 was Josh Brecheen (R-District 6), who introduced similar legislation in two previous legislative sessions; Gus Blackwell (R-District 61) is listed as its sponsor in the House. The bill was opposed by the National Association of Biology Teachers and the American Institute of Biological Sciences, as well as by the grassroots Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education. Still alive in the Oklahoma legislature is the similar House Bill 1674, sponsored by Gus Blackwell (R-District 61) and Sally Kern (R-District 84); Josh Brecheen is listed as its sponsor in the Senate. Writing in The Oklahoma Daily (March 6, 2013), Richard E. Broughton of the University of Oklahoma described HB 1674 as "a 'Trojan horse' bill specifically crafted by an out-of-state, religious think tank to open the door for the teaching of religious or political views in school science classes. ... HB 1674 would write false claims about science into state law, contradicting the wealth of scientific evidence, our own curriculum standards and the expertise of Oklahoma's scientists and teachers." For the text of Oklahoma's Senate Bill 1765 and House Bill 1674 (both PDF), visit: http://webserver1.lsb.state.ok.us/cf_pdf/2013-14%20INT/SB/SB1765%20INT.PDF http://webserver1.lsb.state.ok.us/cf_pdf/2013-14%20FLR/HFLR/HB1674%20HFLR.PDF For the website of Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education, visit: http://www.oklascience.org/ For Broughton's column in The Oklahoma Daily, visit: http://www.oudaily.com/opinion/letter-to-the-editor-ou-professor-opposes-controversial-academic-freedom/article_5d092ac2-8bc4-5158-967d-92a7d181d0d0.html And for NCSE's previous coverage of events in Oklahoma, visit: http://ncse.com/news/oklahoma NCSE'S SCOTT RECEIVES CFI/CSI LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD NCSE's Eugenie C. Scott received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Center for Inquiry and Committee for Skeptical Inquiry in October 2013. In his presentation of the award at a conference of the two organizations in Tacoma, Washington (published in the March/April 2014 issue of Skeptical Inquirer), Ronald A. Lindsay said: *** Where would we be without Eugenie Scott? ... Despite the fact that creationism is an outdated myth, evolution's opponents have been tenacious, determined, and even at times, clever. ... In other words, no one political or legal win for science spells the end of the creationist assault on education. At least not so far. But we would be in a much worse position if not for Eugenie Scott. ... In every new case, in every bad bill in a state legislature, or backward curriculum from a creationist school board, the NCSE has not only brought to bear intellectual and scientific firepower, but in the person of Dr. Scott, science education has perhaps its greatest ambassador. *** Scott was executive director of NCSE from 1987 to 2014, when she was succeeded by Ann Reid; she now serves as chair of NCSE's Advisory Council. She is a long-time fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry; she previously received the Public Education Award from the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry in 1991 and the Defense of Science Award from the Center for Inquiry in 2003. LOUISIANA TO REPEAL 1981 CREATIONIST LAW? Louisiana's Senate Bill 70 would, if enacted, repeal the state's Balanced Treatment for Creation-Science and Evolution-Science Act, which was enacted in 1981 and declared to be unconstitutional by the United States Supreme Court in Edwards v. Aguillard in 1987. Yet the law remains on the books. SB 70 was prefiled by Dan Claitor (R-District 16) on February 17, 2014, and referred to the Senate Committee on Education. It is Claitor's second attempt to repeal the Balanced Treatment Act. In 2013, he amended Senate Bill 205, which concerned foreign language immersion programs in public school districts, to repeal the obsolete law, and the amended bill passed the Senate, despite the opposition of Ben Nevers (D-District 12), the senate sponsor of the so-called Louisiana Science Education of 2008, who argued that it would be useful for the law to be on the books in case the Edwards decision is ever reversed. When SB 205 went to the House Education Committee, however, the provision repealing the Balanced Treatment Act was stripped from the bill, in part owing to the bill's original sponsor describing it as "oddball." The Senate rejected the House version of the bill, but a conference committee then agreed on a version of the bill lacking the repeal provision, which was subsequently passed by both houses of the legislature, leaving the Balanced Treatment Act intact. "This is encouraging, if overdue," commented Barbara Forrest, Professor of Philosophy at Southeastern Louisiana University and a member of NCSE's board of directors. "It shouldn't take twenty-seven years and a Supreme Court case to convince the legislature to repeal the Balanced Treatment Act. But if the legislature is really serious about science education in Louisiana, it will focus on getting the equally pernicious Louisiana Science Education Act off the books." For the text of Louisiana's Senate Bill 70 as introduced (PDF), visit: http://www.legis.la.gov/legis/ViewDocument.aspx?d=871510 For the decision in Edwards v. Aguillard, visit: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/edwards-v-aguillard.html A PREVIEW OF NEW TRENDS IN EARTH-SCIENCE OUTREACH AND ENGAGEMENT NCSE is pleased to offer a free preview of New Trends in Earth-Science Outreach and Engagement (Springer 2013), edited by Jeanette L. Drake, Yekaterina Y. Kontar, and Gwynne S. Rife. The excerpt consists of the entirety of "Infusing Climate and Energy Throughout the Curriculum: Challenges and Opportunities," by NCSE's Minda Berbeco and Mark McCaffrey. "Since both energy choices and climate change will affect students throughout their lives," they write, "it is vital to ensure they will have key knowledge about these 21st-century challenges through formal science education." In her foreword to New Trends in Earth-Science Outreach and Engagement, Christine McEntee, the executive director of the American Geophysical Union, describes the book as "a collection of innovative methods and approaches that can inform the debate about, and contribute to, potential solutions for addressing these worldwide threats [including impacts of climate change]. Earth and space scientists, social scientists, educators, and other key stakeholders can use this monograph to better inform and educate a variety of audiences and assist with evaluating policy solutions." For the preview of New Trends in Earth-Science Outreach and Engagement (PDF), visit: http://ncse.com/book-excerpt For information about the book from its publisher, visit: http://www.springer.com/earth+sciences+and+geography/natural+hazards/book/978-3-319-01820-1 WHAT'S NEW FROM THE SCIENCE LEAGUE OF AMERICA Have you been visiting NCSE's blog, The Science League of America, recently? If not, then you've missed: * Glenn Branch offering a quantitative comparison of the two antievolution bills in Missouri: http://ncse.com/blog/2014/02/fermi-missouri-0015405 * Peter Hess assessing Copernicus's attitude toward Biblical literalism: http://ncse.com/blog/2014/02/copernicusno-friend-to-creationists-0015421 * Josh Rosenau discussing round earth denial and climate change denial: http://ncse.com/blog/2014/02/was-there-ever-flat-earth-consensus-0015426 http://ncse.com/blog/2014/02/denying-globe-vs-denying-global-warming-0015427 And much more besides! For The Science League of America, visit: http://ncse.com/blog Thanks for reading. And don't forget to visit NCSE's website -- http://ncse.com -- where you can always find the latest news on evolution and climate education and threats to them. -- Sincerely, Glenn Branch Deputy Director National Center for Science Education, Inc. 420 40th Street, Suite 2 Oakland, CA 94609-2509 510-601-7203 x305 fax: 510-601-7204 800-290-6006 branch@ncse.com http://ncse.com Check out NCSE's new blog, Science League of America: http://ncse.com/blog Read Reports of the NCSE on-line: http://reports.ncse.com Subscribe to NCSE's free weekly e-newsletter: http://groups.google.com/group/ncse-news NCSE is on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter: http://www.facebook.com/evolution.ncse http://www.youtube.com/NatCen4ScienceEd http://twitter.com/ncse NCSE's work is supported by its members. Join today! http://ncse.com/join
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