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Still hiding from Darwin |
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Florida leaders trying to woo world-class research institutions in the same league as Scripps and Max Planck to the state should hope their scientists have better things to do tomorrow morning than watch the Florida Board of Education discuss putting the word “evolution” into the state standards. Because God forbid that the board bows to religious pressure and continues to hide from the public school curriculum the fundamental concept of modern biology. What are the chances these researchers will want to subject their own children to public schools too afraid to teach science? Of course, the actual concepts of Darwin’s theory as it has been modified in the subsequent century and a half have been part of the Sunshine State Standards since 1996. The major change under consideration now is to use the word. A brief discussion from Jeb: America's Next Bush on the former governor’s unwillingness to anger Christian conservatives on the matter – which remains of interest as those board members on record as opposing the new standard were both appointed by Bush: Even in cases where specific personalities were not involved, Jeb’s coziness with fundamentalist Christians made for suspect educational policy for everybody else. A perfect example was in the autumn of 2005, with the backdrop of the “intelligent design” trial going on in Pennsylvania and a review of the state’s Sunshine State Standards for science looming in the coming year. Some important background: Jeb’s own professed faith, Roman Catholicism, has made its peace with science. Sure, the Vatican burned the monk Giordano Bruno alive for declaring that the sun was the center of the solar system and put Galileo under house arrest for the last four decades of his life for the same offense. But the church has gotten over that, and has come around to the view that faith and science are complementary, not in conflict. Mainstream Catholic schools in Florida teach the theory of evolution in their biology classes. Some even more important background: Just two years earlier, in 2003, Jeb had successfully courted the renowned Scripps Research Institute to branch out into a second campus in Florida, and had persuaded the legislature to give the company $310 million in state money to do it. Among the ostensible benefits was that Florida would be at the cutting edge of biomedical and pharmaceutical research, with all the prestige that would bring in the academic world. And what exactly does Scripps do? Molecular biology and genetic manipulation using recombinant DNA. And what are those based on? Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection, modified and developed over a century and a half of scientific experimentation. Although most of the state legislators who voted to give Scripps the
money probably did not realize this – an honestly bizarre moment was
watching one of the Scripps scientists explaining gene sequencing to
the Florida House of Representatives … something only slightly less
silly than trying to teach quantum mechanics to a tribe of orangutans
– Jeb is certainly knowledgeable enough to understand the inherent
irony. This is probably why he took such umbrage when I asked him whether
children at voucher schools ought to get the science background they
would need if they wanted to work someday at Scripps. That autumn of the trial in Harrisburg also happened to be when Jeb’s education department hired creationist Cheri Yecke as chancellor of K-12 education in Florida. Yecke had been forced out of a similar job in Minnesota after trying to sneak “intelligent design” – the new code phrase for creationism – into the public school curriculum there. She denied that had been her intention, and claimed that the whole episode was pure politics – a Democratic legislative chamber saluting a Republican governor. She sought refuge at a conservative think tank, from which she was rescued, naturally, by Jeb. Whatever the motives behind her hiring, it raised eyebrows among school administrators and science teachers, who suspected the worst. Jeb did little to assuage them when he was finally asked whether “intelligent design” should be taught in public school science classrooms. Jeb paused, and said: “It’s not part of our standards. Nor is creationism. Nor is Darwinism or evolution, either.” Huh? The state’s Sunshine State Standards for science, last modified in 1996 (prior to Jeb’s ascension), are actually quite clear about evolution. Eighth graders are expected to know that the “fossil record provides evidence that changes in the kinds of plants and animals in the environment have been occurring over time.” High school students are expected to understand how genetic mutations occur and how “natural selection ensures that those who are best adapted to their surroundings survive to reproduce” – the two fundamental concepts underlying evolutionary biology. When I pointed this out to Jeb, he claimed that he had been told by his education commissioner that the standards did not include evolution – not a terribly likely scenario given that his commissioner by that point, a former science teacher, had been part of the education bureaucracy in Florida for a dozen years before Jeb took office. So then Jeb said: “I like what we have right now. And I don’t think there needs to be any changes. I don’t think we need to restrict discussion, but it doesn’t need to be required, either.” It was an extraordinary revealing exchange. Jeb does not like to be caught flat-footed on any topic, let alone one in which, as the self-professed “education governor,” he should have had mastery. And yet, when forced to choose between looking ignorant and admitting that he has allowed godless secular humanism to remain in the public school science curriculum nearly seven years after he’d taken office, Jeb picked ignorance. Such is his fealty to the Christian Right. |
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February
18, 2008