The Ohio Board of Education will hold a panel discussion featuring both advocates and opponents of including intelligent design (ID) in the newly drafted statewide science standards at its March meeting. The decision to hold the discussion came after a contentious meeting on Sunday, January 14th, at which lawyer John Calvert, of the Kansas based Intelligent Design Network, made the case for inclusion of the controversial field in the standards. Opponents of ID were not allowed to speak at the meeting.
When asked if any other state in the country currently taught ID, Calvert confessed that none did. Board member Deborah Owen Fink then stated that Ohio could be on “the cutting edge” by being the first to do so.
“Creationism and intelligent design are more religious and philosophical areas than tested, scientific areas,” said John Crooks, director of the Science and Mathematics Division at Lorain County Community College, and a member of the committee that wrote the current draft of the standards.
Science Excellence for All Ohioans (SEAO), a project of the American Family Association of Ohio, is leading the effort to make changes to the current draft of the standards. NCSE has prepared an analysis of their proposals.
SEAO's proposed changes are available on their web site.
NCSE's analysis of their proposed changes are available in in both html and PDF formats.
Please feel free to distribute to any interested parties.
January 17, 2002