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2 Science Groups SayKansas Can't Use Their Evolutino Papers
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Thu, 27 Oct 2005 18:54:38 -0400
Begin forwarded message: From: Randall <rvh40 () insightbb com> Date: October 27, 2005 6:46:14 PM EDT To: JMG <johnmacsgroup () yahoogroups com> Cc: Dave <dave () farber net> Subject: 2 Science Groups SayKansas Can't Use Their Evolutino Papershttp://nytimes.com/2005/10/27/national/27cnd-kansas.html? ei=5094&en=8207d57fc0db8eca&hp=&ex=1130472000&partner=homepage&pagewante d=print
2 Science Groups Say Kansas Can't Use Their Evolution Papers By JODI WILGOREN CHICAGO, Oct. 27 - Two leading science organizations have denied the Kansas board of education permission to use their copyrighted materials in the state's proposed new science standards because of the standards' critical approach to evolution. The National Academy of Sciences and the National Science Teachers Association said the much-disputed new standards "will put the students of Kansas at a competitive disadvantage as they take their place in the world." The stinging rebuke came less than two weeks before the state school board is expected to put the science standards into effect. The new standards have also received a lukewarm review from an external education company. While the copyright denial could cause delay in their adoption, as the standards are rewritten, it is unlikely to derail the board's conservative majority in its mission to require that challenges to Darwin's theories be taught in the state's classrooms. "Kansas students will not be well-prepared for the rigors of higher education or the demands of an increasingly complex and technologically-driven world if their science education is based on these standards," Ralph J. Cicerone, president of the National Academy, and Michael J. Padilla, president of the teachers' group, said in a joint written statement today. "Instead, they will put the students of Kansas at a competitive disadvantage as they take their place in the world." In the statement, as well as in letters to the state board, the groups opposed the standards for singling out evolution as a controversial theory, and also for changing the definition of science itself so that it is not restricted to natural phenomena. A third organization, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, echoed those concerns in a news release supporting the copyright denial, saying: "Students are ill-served by any effort in science classrooms to blur the distinction between science and other ways of knowing, including those concerned with the supernatural." The president of the state school board, Steve Abrams, who is the leader of its 6-4 conservative majority, said members could approve the standards on Nov. 8 as planned - but with a caveat directing a copyright lawyer to remove direct references to the groups' materials. "The impact is minimal - it won't change the concepts," Dr. Abrams said. "They obviously don't have copyrights on concepts." But the chairman of the standards-writing committee, Steve Case, said copyrighted material appears on almost all of the document's 100 pages, and predicted it could take two to three months to revise them. "In some cases it's just a phrase, but in some cases it's extensive," said Dr. Case, an assistant research professor at the University of Kansas, who opposes the criticism of evolution that conservatives inserted into the standards. "You try to keep the idea but change the wording around, the writing becomes horrifically bad." The copyright skirmish is not a surprise: the two groups took a similar step in 1999, when the Kansas board stripped the standards of virtually any reference to evolution, a move that was reversed when conservative members were ousted from office. A board member who supports evolution, Sue Gamble, said the science groups' strong statement would not block the standards' adoption but could have a longer-term effect. "Nothing is going to stop these six members from doing what they're going to do," Ms. Gamble said of the board's conservative majority, four of whom are up for re-election in 2006. "It won't make any difference, but I think it will make a difference next year in the election." -- "We've got the hatemongers who literally hate this president, and that is so wrong. . . . The people who hate George Bush hate him because he's a follower of Jesus Christ, unashamedly says so and applies his faith inhis day-to-day operations." -- Rev. Jerry Falwell, on C-SPAN's "Washington Journal"
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- 2 Science Groups SayKansas Can't Use Their Evolutino Papers David Farber (Oct 27)