Having a mother who works very closely with the Georgia Department of Education (I’ve met Kathy Cox, and can fully state her to be incompetent and retarded.), I guess I can comment.
A few years ago, the issue arose when a biology teacher was teaching, and a student mentioned the theory of evolution. So the teacher went into a lecture and explained the theory and compared it to creationism. A student went home and talked to some rather conservative parents about what he learned, and the teacher was soon being bewildered with complaints from parents for teaching theories, not quite grasping that creationism is also a theory. Parents sued the school or something, the case went to the highest court in the county (Cobb County if I remember correctly) and the case was thrown out, with the judge saying something along the lines of teachers being able to talk about and teach whatever fit their curriculum. Since evolution is a primary concept of biology, the teacher was well within his rights to explain the theory to the inquiring student and proceed with the lesson plan.
Since then, however, there has been a lot of talk about this nonsense. Parents have risen against the Department of Education in an effort to rid our schools of the theory of education. Right here is where it gets political; currently, the state is in the midsts of a state wide effort to get parents involved with their schools. Now, it’s great that these parents, as zealous as they are, are interested and being involved, to not listen to them is to alienate them and any other parents who are trying to get involved with their childrens academics. I see this as nothing more than propaganda, the DoE making it known that the parents concerns are being heard and considered, but I doubt that any such change will ever be made. Why exactly this is making national headlines, I don’t know.
When I was in Biology, evolution was not much of a topic we covered, and neither was creationisim. To deny one is to deny the other, and that’s basically what happened. Neither was ever really mentioned. Then again, freshman year is sort of a blur.
Anyways, I doubt anything like this will go through - because fundamentally, it is denying our children of knowledge, which is the entire point of school. Evolution and Creationisim are controversial no doubt, however they are also very pivitol to a lot of people. They are answers to questions that bug every person on the planet; Where did we come from? Apes? People in the sky? Whatever it is, it is a burning hole in our existence, and that hole will never be filled until the answers are truley discovered. In the meantime, people are always going to bicker over whose right and whose wrong, and unfortunatly, shit like this will clog our judicial system for years to come.
But I wouldn’t think much of it.
And Georgians are not inbreeds, that would be Alabama. Someone failed geography ;p
