An appropriate time because starting on Thursday, March 26th, the Texas State Board of Education will meet once more to finalize the Science TEKS that will govern how science will be taught in Texas’ public schools, and more importantly, what demands will be delivered to the publishers of science books so that Texas, a huge school textbook customer, will adopt their textbooks in the upcoming adoption cycle.
To what end you would ask. Why would the NCSE do this just now?
Well, for one thing, I as an interested party in science education have had to depend upon the kindness of strangers to provide first- or second-hand coverage of what transpires at these board meetings. People who “live-blog” the meetings. People who provide snippets of conversation through audio recordings.
But at the NCSE’s You Tube home page, you have one-stop shopping.
The NCSE has a very complete recording of the testimony of one of their own at a recent SBOE meeting. Dr. Genie Scott gave testimony on inclusion of the “strengths and weaknesses” argument in the Science TEKS, especially as found in the Biology curriculum vis-à-vis the teaching of evolution. It also shows her fielding questions from creationist and non-creationist board members alike.
It also shows Don McLeroy’s comments at the meeting, showing how by waving publications about, shouting who cites whom in them, McLeroy arrives at disingenuous conclusions that no one but another creationist would come to.
One part of this last set of videos has been “pulled” by You Tube, leaving the rest of us to speculate on whom had it pulled and why.
So if you want to go and watch our state school board in action, I suggest perusing the small library of videos there.
I, for
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