This should tell you a lot about the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of the Texas State Board of Education. Last year the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute sharply criticized the state board for its “ideological manipulation,” historical revisionism and contempt for expertise in adopting new social studies curriculum standards for Texas public schools in 2010. Today a new Fordham report gives science curriculum standards adopted by the state board in 2009 a grade of “C.” Yet here’s what state board Chairwoman Barbara Cargill, R-The Woodlands, had to say about the new Fordham report:
“As a science teacher, I am pleased that our standards received a score of 5 out of 7 for content and rigor. We look forward to continuing to work with Texas teachers to bring the best instruction to the classroom with our excellent science standards.”
Seriously? She celebrates a “C” grade? She really thinks Texas is giving kids the “best instruction” with “excellent science standards” that, in fact, get low marks from a conservative education think-tank? News flash for Ms. Cargill: Most parents don’t think mediocrity is something to celebrate, especially when it comes to the education of their children.
From the Fordham report’s section on Texas:
“Texas has produced a set of science standards with areas of strength—including a particularly well-done sequence for earth and space science—but also with weaknesses that cannot be overlooked. These include a tendency across nearly all disciplines to pay lip service to critical content with vague statements, and, somewhat less often, the presence of material that’s well below grade level.”
While giving the standards decent marks in some areas, Fordham describes other sections with words like “sketchy,” “redundant,” “riddled with errors,” and “woefully imbalanced.” Would you describe such standards as “excellent”? We doubt it, but an ideologue like Cargill does.
Don McLeroy, a former board member who served as chairman during the science curriculum standards adoption, was pleased with Fordham’s remarks about how evolution is covered in the standards. Says McLeroy:
“The report confirms what I have always insisted: that the creationists inserted real scientific rigor into the teaching of evolution.”
Good grief. Fordham actually said “evolution is all but ignored” in standards for primary grades, and discussions on the topic in middle school grades are inaccurate. The report points to one particular misleading section about the evolution of finches:
“Creationists often distort these important findings to argue that Darwinian macroevolution does not occur—instead, microevolution does. In addition, the word ‘evolution’ is never used in any of the middle school standards, and the term “natural selection” is never explained.”
Fordham does give the high school bi0logy of evolution good marks, noting that “there are no concessions to ‘controversies’ or ‘alternative theories.'” But that’s actually despite the efforts of Cargill and McLeroy, who wanted the standards to include phony “weaknesses” of evolution promoted by creationists. Fortunately, TFN and other supporters of science education kept that nonsense out of the standards.
And then this from Fordham:
“(T)he high school biology course is exemplary in its choice and presentation of topics, including its thorough consideration of biological evolution. Even so, the term ‘natural selection’ appears just three times, as does the word ‘evolution’ and its variants. It is hard to see how Texas students will be able to handle this course, given the insufficient foundations offered prior to high school.”
It’s no surprise Fordham found that “natural selection” gets short shrift in the standards — it was one of the core concepts that McLeroy and other creationists on the board specifically tried to weaken in 2009.
Public education is clearly under siege in Texas. The Legislature is cutting billions of dollars in funding for public schools. Thousands of teachers are losing their jobs. And members of the State Board of Education are celebrating mediocrity (or worse) in the curriculum standards they’re adopting.
It’s hard to imagine that voters need more evidence that this year — with all 15 state board seats up for election — will be critical to the future of public education in Texas. Check out TFN’s SBOE Election Watch page here.
Wow, McLeroy, creationists? Seriously? Wasn’t that cat supposed to stay in the bag? Didn’t you promise that you would not let your religious obsessions interfere with your obligations as a board member?
So, now, McLeroy openly admits that he purposefully injected religious arguments, as validated by the Supreme Court, into the science standards. Nice.
Excellent review, Dan. Your responses are absolutely accurate. Yes, Barbara Cargill and Don McLeroy are off base, living in the twilight zone of their Creationist fantasies. Texas received a C for its science standards despite the poor quality of the Biology standards as manipulated by Republican SBOE members. Overall, including Physics, Chemistry, etc., Texas deserved a C, but would have earned an A or B if Biology was better. I surmise that Fordham overlooked the Creationist-inserted standards because in the end they had no effect. The publishers basically ignored the Creationists’ hints about bogus problems of evolution that they forced into the the standards, and the changed ideological makeup of the Board prevented any backlash. I cover this in more detail on the Texas Citizens for Science website.
Not one to normally question Dan’s accuracy… if Cargill’s “numbers” are correct, a score of 5 out of 7 is 71%, a very low C (or C-). I think I would re-title this to “Celebrating the Possibility of a Rise to Mediocrity in Texas”. ;¬)
Mars,
Cargill was referencing only one part of the review. But we get it. 🙂
An oldie:
Q: Why do Oklahoma license plates say “Oklahoma is OK!” up at the top?
A: Because nobody in the legislature knew how to spell “mediocre.”
Its Mediocri T