Creationism Creeps into U.S. Classrooms

[William T Goodall]

http://www.livescience.com/history/080521-creationist-teachers.html

"By Robin Lloyd, LiveScience Senior Editor
posted: 21 May 2008 ET
One in eight U.S. high school biology teachers presents creationism or  
intelligent design in a positive light in the classroom, a new survey  
shows, despite a federal court's recent ban against it.

And a quarter of the nation's high school biology teachers say they  
devoted at least one or two classroom hours to the topics, with about  
half presenting it favorably and half presenting it as an invalid  
alternative.

Those results are part of a nationally representative, random sample  
of 939 teachers who filled out surveys between March 5, 2007, and May  
1, 2007 on questions concerning the teaching of evolution. The figures  
have a 3 percent margin of error.

The research, funded by the National Science Foundation, also revealed  
that between 12 percent and 16 percent of the nation's biology  
teachers are creationists, and about one in six of them have a "young  
Earth" orientation, which means they believe that human beings were  
created by God in their present form within the past 10,000 years.

Scientists, on the other hand, agree that humans evolved from a common  
primate ancestor in a process that stretches back tens of millions of  
years. The theory of evolution on which this is based is one of the  
most well-supported theories in science."

[snip]

"Victory in the courts and state standards will not ensure that  
evolution is included in high school science classes, Berkman and his  
colleagues conclude. A bigger impact would come by focusing on  
certification standards for high school biology teachers, such as  
requiring all teachers to complete a course in evolutionary biology."


Qualifications Maru


  "The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product  
of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still  
primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish." - Albert  
Einstein

-- 
William T Goodall
Mail : wtg at wtgab.demon.co.uk
Web  : http://www.wtgab.demon.co.uk
Blog : http://radio.weblogs.com/0111221/