Demoting Darwin

What audacity. What nerve. Imagine emphasizing a theory scientists hold as fundamental to biology and that religious leaders, including Pope John Paul II, consider worthy of further investigation.

The board's irresponsible decision means that the state's 304 school districts will each decide how to teach biology--with or without evolution. While library materials on evolution are unlikely to be challenged in Kansas, several people with whom I spoke believe that school boards may push libraries to add materials on creationism, the belief that a divine power created the universe. That's what happened lastyear in Melvindale, MI, where the public school board agreed to place 19 community-recommended titles in libraries after it rejected a local proposal to teach creationism in class.

The textbook Of Pandas and People: The Central Question of Biological Origins (Haughton, 1996) by P. Davis and D. H. Kenyon was among the titles added. Of Pandas and People "isperhaps the most likely book to be recommended to school librarians" by groups that want creationist materials in collections, says Molleen Matsumura, network project director of the National Center for Science Education (NCSE), a small,nonprofit group in Berkeley, CA, that works to support evolution education in schools.

Is there any reason not to have materials in libraries on religious beliefs about creation? No. Well-educated students should be aware of both evolutionary theory and creation beliefs. "We have books on both sides. That's what libraries are for," says Charli O'Dell, media specialist at Boltz Junior High School in Ft. Collins, CO, former biology teacher, and author of "Confused About Fusion: Weed Your Science Collection with a Pro" (SLJ, October 1998, pp. 32â?"36).

Sadly, few books now in print are suitable for students just starting to study biology, says O'Dell. Greenhaven's Opposing Viewpoints series used to have a title on evolution and another on religion and science, but they are no longer in print, she says. She likes Eyewitness Science: Evolution (DK, 1993; see review, SLJ, September 1993, p. 238) by Linda Gamlin and Get a Grip on Evolution (Time-Life, 1999) by David Burnie."Get a Grip's pages are printed on the same stock used to make brown paper grocery bags, which should appeal to kids," O'Dell says. "It's small, fun to read, illustrated, andwritten so the average ninth-grade biology student can understand it. Another book, Evolution and the Myth of Creationism by Tim H. Berra (Stanford, 1990), is written with more depth and breadth, but still uses vocabulary that most first-year biology students can handle. It includes the typical debate discussions and a robust bibliography for further reading on both sides of the issue."

We need more quality introductory material on the origins of humanity. But we also need an educational community that doesn't absolve itself of teaching established scientific theories when faced with political pressure from the far right.