Writing in the Baton Rouge Advocate (July 7, 2016), Barbara Forrest rebutted a series of misleading claims about the so-called Louisiana Science Education Act of 2008. Far from wanting to improve science education, she explained, the law's backers sought "to give sympathetic teachers cover to undermine evolution and climate science by using code language such as 'critical thinking' and 'logical analysis' when teaching these subjects."
In the same column, Forrest also observed that representing "the 'Climategate' scandal" as an example of the politicization of scientific inquiry is exactly backwards. "The truth is that thousands of stolen e-mails were posted on the internet and subsequently used by climate science deniers to undermine legitimate scientific research. Nine separate investigations revealed no wrongdoing by the scientists."
Forrest's column comes as the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education is undertaking to review the state science education standards. A June 22, 2016, press release from BESE explains that reviewers will be nominated by school districts and organizations, selected by BESE in August 2016, work through the fall, and recommend updates to the standards in March 2017.
A member of NCSE's board of directors and a recipient of its Friend of Darwin award, Forrest is Professor of Philosophy at Southeastern Louisiana University and the coauthor, with Paul R. Gross, of Creationism's Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design (2004). She testified for the plaintiffs in Kitzmiller v. Dover, the 2005 case establishing the unconstitutionality of teaching "intelligent design" creationism in the public schools.