Creationist Influence on Science Education

Jennifer Welsh recounts a new study analyzing the teaching of evolution in high school classrooms.  The results offer a bleak picture for science literacy in the next generation.  Evolution serves as the central, unifying theory of the biological sciences.  To understand biology is to understand evolution and vice versa.  Unfortunately, only 28% of science teachers actively provide detailed evidence and explanations of evolution for their students.  While I am glad to find myself in the top of my profession, 13% of science teachers actually preach creationism to their classes.

Most science standards in the US weave evolution throughout the curriculum.  Evolution helps us make sense of structural and physiological adaptations, genotypic and phenotypic variations, and taxonomic and ecological relationships.  Biology students should be introduced to the historical narrative of Darwin's life, the early description of natural selection, and the evidence accumulated by other scientists since 1859.  I like to talk about the common examples, but prefer to find the more interesting cases from recent studies.  I also confront student misconceptions by having students write down questions about evolution which I answer during the evolution unit.  Most questions ask about "the human-monkey thing" or about Darwin's life and beliefs.

From an old study, but shows our rank
in the world of evolution understanding.

So what happens with the other 72% of science teachers?  Like I said, 13% actively teach creationism/intelligent design.  My own high school teacher did not believe in evolution and refused to talk about it.  We completely skipped that particular chapter in high school, so I never actually learned anything about evolution until my freshman biology course in college.  That happens way too much.

Another 60% of science teachers barely broach the topic of evolution.  Teachers fear repercussions of mentioning evolution and offending fundamentalist students or parents (a few cases have occurred in NC).  Too avoid these problems, the teachers cover just enough to prepare the students for the final exam without going into detail or answering any questions.  Apart from reprisals, many teacher do not feel that they possess adequate knowledge of evolution to teach the subject.  Some teachers taught both evolution and creationism to let the students decide for themselves.

As a nation, our position in science education continues to drop (along with math and reading) as almost 40% of Americans reject evolution.  I remain convinced that most negative reactions to evolution stem from misunderstandings of the topic.  To counter these misconceptions, we need qualified science teachers who aren't afraid to teach science.  If our teachers don't accept accepted science, you can expect our collective scientific literacy to continue in the negative direction.