Science: Grade = F

The Kansas standards have been much in the news of late, and with good reason. A very detailed Kansas Science Education Standards, Fifth Working Draft (June 1999) was the fruit of a year’s labor by a committee of highly qualified scientists, teachers from both public and Catholic schools, and expert consultants. The resulting document, about 100 pages long, would have attained one of the highest ratings among the state standards reviewed here. Its special strength lay in the way it tied together individual standards with brief but clear explications of the underlying theory and methodology.

As is now widely known, however, the State Board of Education gutted the document, removing almost every reference to the theoretical backbones of the sciences having historical content - astronomy, geology, and biology - and replacing some of the material with nonsense of a pseudoscientific bent. There is little point in going into detail as to how this was done; a single example will suffice. In the following passage from Standard 5, Benchmark 5, Eighth Grade, original material removed by the Board is in red strikeout type and their additions in blue underline:

Benchmark 5: The students will observe the diversity of living things and relate their adaptations to their survival or extinction.

Millions of species of animals, plants, and microorganisms are alive today. Animals and plants vary in body plans and internal structures. Biological evolution, gradual changes of characteristics of organisms over many generations, Over time, genetic variation acted upon by natural selection has brought variations in populations. This is termed microevolution. Therefore, a A structural characteristic or behavior that helps an organism to survive and reproduce in its environment is called an adaptation. When the environment changes and the adaptive characteristics or behaviors are insufficient, the species becomes extinct.

As students investigate different types of organisms, teachers guide them toward thinking about similarities and differences. Students can compare similarities between organisms in different parts of the world, such as tigers in Asia and mountain lions in North America. Instruction needs to be designed to uncover and prevent misconceptions about natural selection. Students tend to think of all individuals in a population responding to change quickly rather than over a long period of time. Natural selection can maintain or deplete genetic variation but does not add new information to the existing genetic code. Using examples of microevolution, such as Darwin’s finches or the peppered moths of Manchester helps develop understanding of natural selection over time. (Resource: The Beak of the Finch by Jonathon Weiner). Providing students with Examining fossil evidence and allowing them time to construct their own explanations is important in developing middle level students’ assists the student’s understanding of extinction as a natural process that has affected Earth’s species over time.

[Reminder from Jack Krebs: all the added material referenced here in blue underline by the Fordham Foundation was copied verbatim from the creationist Willis draft 8A, and inserted without attribution by the Board writing team of Abrams, Hill, and Voth.]

There is much more of this ignorant mischief. Worse, it is not limited to biological evolution, as is almost universally true in other state standards of this genre. Rather, as noted above, there is a sweeping excision of all references to evolution in the universe as a whole, in the solar system, and on Earth. By means of these cuts, the Kansas State Board of Education has reduced biology to natural history, geology to rock collecting, and astronomy to stargazing.

The direct damage affects two-thirds of the standard physical science-life science-Earth/space science curriculum. But the damage extends to the non-historical sciences in a more subtle way. Teaching students that most sciences lack a theoretical backbone denigrates the significance of theory in physics and chemistry as well.

The Kansas State Education Standards in science are a disservice and an insult to the young people of Kansas. Dorothy went from Kansas to Oz seeking wonders and there found empty pseudoscience. She had the good sense to return to Kansas. Sadly, the State Board of Education seems to wish to issue a one-way ticket to all the state’s children.