Wisconsin City's Schools Allowing Creationism
 

GRANTSBURG, Wis. Nov 6, 2004 — The city's school board has revised its science curriculum to allow the teaching of creationism, prompting an outcry from more than 300 educators who urged that the decision be reversed.

School board members believed that a state law governing the teaching of evolution was too restrictive. The science curriculum "should not be totally inclusive of just one scientific theory," said Joni Burgin, superintendent of the district of 1,000 students in northwest Wisconsin.

Last month, when the board examined its science curriculum, language was added calling for "various models/theories" of origin to be incorporated.

The decision provoked more than 300 biology and religious studies faculty members to write a letter last week urging the Grantsburg board to reverse the policy. It follows a letter sent previously by 43 deans at Wisconsin public universities.

"Insisting that teachers teach alternative theories of origin in biology classes takes time away from real learning, confuses some students and is a misuse of limited class time and public funds," said Don Waller, a botanist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Wisconsin law mandates that evolution be taught, but school districts are free to create their own curricular standards, said Joe Donovan, a spokesman for the state Department of Public Instruction.

There have been scattered efforts around the nation for other school boards to adopt similar measures. Last month the Dover Area School Board in Pennsylvania voted to require the teaching of alternative theories to evolution, including "intelligent design" the idea that life is too complex to have developed without a creator.

The state education board in Kansas was heavily criticized in 1999 when it deleted most references to evolution. The decision was reversed in 2001.

In March, the Ohio Board of Education narrowly approved a lesson plan that some critics contended opens the door to teaching creationism.


http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=232573

I expect crap like this from the South, I am shocked it is taking hold in northern states.

Re: Wisconsin City's Schools Allowing Creationism
 

I would have no problem with teaching creationism in the public schools. I think it's important for kinds to learn as much as they can about different things, it allows for more open minded children.


However, I do have a hard time calling creationism a scientific theory. I don't see how it has any SCIENTIFIC evidence to support its theory. It's a theory based on faith. Perhaps public schools should start offering a comparitive religions course to teach kids about major world religions and teach creationism there.

Damn, that would have made history and biology a lot easier.

Seriously, I would have loved to be able to opt to take those exams.

Your telling me... answering any question as "God willed it" would have seriously cut down on my study time...

Re: Wisconsin City's Schools Allowing Creationism
 

Look back at the article (at least what I've left in of your post) and note the locations of those states. Now tell me again why you expect it in the South? None of those are Southern states.

I don't like the creationism thing either, but I sure as heck resent your stereotyping of my part of the country.

Re: Re: Wisconsin City's Schools Allowing Creationism
 

I am from and live in the south. I have seen this in Georgia to. So it is my part of the country too.

Here is a new article about a Georgia evolution case...

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...olution_debate

I would like to point out that I have lived in Wisconsin my whole life and never heard of Grantsburg.

So I looked it up. It has a population of 1407.

I wouldn't stress too much, you guys. This is probably going to affect about 10 kids a year.

I was just thinking the same thing. It's in NW Wi very near the MN border, for everybody else who was wondering.

Wait...are you sure this isn't Dayton, TN???!?

The funniest part is that the school board, which I'm sure is full of people I want to smash with a rake, is much more (accidently) correct than most, b/c one of the downfalls of our educational system is teaching only the prevailing theory for certain scientific concepts that we don't really understand fully.

Now, I'm pretty sure the Earth is older than 5gs, and we can ACTUALLY MAKE MICROEVOLUTION HAPPEN, so this decision is laughable - but hey, when you let people govern themselves, you'll have that. They should make the kids read "The Story of B" by Daniel Quinn, too . . . there will be dozens of mindbent rural WI kids running around with no clue how to use this newfound freedom.