AUSTIN, Texas - One is a nutritionist who believes “creation science” based on biblical principles should be taught in the classroom. Another is a chemical engineer who is listed as a “Darwin Skeptic” on the website of the Creation Science Hall of Fame. A third is a trained biologist and fellow of the Discovery Institute, the Seattle-based center of the intelligent-design movement and a vice president at an evangelical ministry in Plano, Texas.
As Texas gears up to select biology textbooks for use by high school students throughout the next decade, the panel responsible for reviewing submissions from publishers has raised concern because a number of its members do not accept evolution and climate change as scientific truth.
In the state whose governor, Rick Perry, boasted as a candidate for president that his schools taught both creationism and evolution, the state Board of Education, which includes members who hold creationist views, helped nominate several members of the textbook review panel. Others were named by parents and educators. Prospective candidates could also nominate themselves. The state’s education commissioner, Michael Williams, a Republican, made the final appointments to the 28-member panel. Six of them are known to reject evolution.
Some Texans worry that ideologically driven review panel members and state school board members are slowly eroding science education in the state.
“Utterly unqualified partisan politicians will look at what utterly unqualified citizens have said about a textbook and decide whether it meets the requirements of a textbook,” lamented Kathy Miller, president of the Texas Freedom Network, which monitors the activities of far-right organizations.
Publishers including well-known companies such as Pearson, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and McGraw-Hill submitted 14 biology textbooks for consideration this year. Reports from the review panels have been sent to publishers, who can now make changes. Williams will review the changes and recommend books to the state board. The state board will vote on a final approved list of textbooks in November.
The reports contained comments from Karen Beathard, a senior lecturer in the department of nutrition and food science at Texas A&M University, who wrote in a review of a textbook submitted by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt that “Students should have the opportunity to use their critical thinking skills to weigh the evidence between evolution and ‘creation science.’”
In reviews of other textbooks, panel members disputed the scientific evidence, questioning, for example,whether the fossil record actually demonstrates a process of mutation and natural selection throughout billions of years. “The fossil record can be interpreted in other ways than evolutionary with equal justification,” one reviewer wrote. Among the anti-evolution panelists are Ide Trotter, a chemical engineer, and Raymond Bohlin, a biologist and fellow of the Discovery Institute.
Historically, given the state’s size, Texas’ textbook selections have had an outsize effect on what ended up in classrooms throughout the country. That influence is waning because publishers can customize digital editions, and many states are moving to adopt new science standards with evolution firmly at their center.
The publishers are considering some changes. A spokesman for Pearson said the publisher had made some adjustments but that they “did not compromise the integrity of the science.” She added, “Our book has always been honest that evolutionary biologists don’t have all the answers, nor does evolution provide all the answers.”
A spokesman for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt said that the publisher had not yet received any requests for corrections, but that the company’s textbook was of the “highest quality based on research.”
Across the country, textbook publishers are likely to increasingly tailor materials to the new science standards developed by a consortium of 26 state governments and several groups of scientists and teachers.
Already seven states - California, Delaware, Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland, Rhode Island and Vermont - have officially adopted the standards. This month, after a legislative committee in Kentucky voted to reject the new science standards, Gov. Steven Beshear overruled the decision and said he would use his executive powers to put the standards in place.
Front Section, Pages 5 on 09/29/2013