In 1981, the State of Arkansas passed into law a bill that demanded that if evolution was taught in state-supported schools, then something called “Creation Science” — aka the book of Genesis read literally — had also to be taught. This happened during the interregnum between Bill Clinton’s first time in the governor’s mansion and when he regained it two years later. The bill was debated for all of half an hour by the legislature and signed by the then-governor, a man as unqualified for the post as he was surprised at getting it.
Obviously this law violated the First Amendment separation of church and state, and so the ACLU swung into action to get it declared unconstitutional. After a two-week trial, the federal judge ruled precisely that and so that was the end of the Arkansas “Balanced Treatment for Creation-Science and Evolution-Scient Act,” as it was called. I was one of the witnesses for the plaintiff, called in to testify on the history and philosophy of science, showing that whereas evolutionary theory is science, creation science is not science but religion.
Among the other expert witnesses was the late Stephen Jay Gould, the well-known paleontologist and popular-science writer, and the late Langdon Gilkey, the most eminent liberal theologian of his day. But far more impressive than any of us was a local, high school biology teacher. I remember sitting in the courtroom as he testified. The assistant attorney general was trying to tie him into knots over some technical point in evolutionary biology. Finally, the man blurted out: “Mr. Williams, I’m not a scientist. I’m a science educator. I love science, I really do. And I love my students. My job is to take the science and teach it to my students. I am not a leading researcher. I am an educator, and I have my pride and professional responsibilities. And I just can’t teach that stuff [meaning creationism] to my kids.” Sometimes it is just a privilege to listen to other human beings and recognize that they are better people than you are. (I am quoting from memory. I have just looked at the actual transcript of the trial. The teacher’s words are even more moving that I remembered.)
I have been thinking about that man a lot since I wrote my piece on why I am weeping for Florida State University. In that post, I made the point that there is something seriously out of kilter in an institution, claiming to be a place of higher education, that lavishes funds on the football program but starves the academic side. In passing, I made reference to one of the very good things that is happening on the FSU campus,: the project to upgrade the teaching of future school teachers of mathematics and science.
A number of people asked me about this and so I dug into it a little more. Based on a very successful program at the University of Texas at Austin, it is humming along nicely now, although as you might expect there are all sorts of territorial tensions as science ed is taken from the College of Education and put in the College of Arts and Sciences. (I should say that the dean of the College of Ed is one of the leaders in this project, and some members of her faculty are deeply involved, so it is not simply plunder of one part of the university by another part. Anything but, in fact.)
The relevance of the Arkansas teacher struck home when I looked at some of the figures. Get this. In 2007 (the last year for which there are available figures) within the State of Florida 1,295 people were hired to teach mathematics. Of those, only 394 had qualifications in teaching mathematics. Within the state, 1,154 people were hired to teach science. Of these, 282 had science qualifications. In other words, and I can attest anecdotally to this at my kids’ high school, most of the people being hired in Florida to teach mathematics and science aren’t qualified. And note that these are the numbers of people being hired, not necessarily the numbers needed.
In other words, we are simply not getting into our classrooms people like the Arkansas teacher who just loved science (including mathematics) for its own sake. Or if we are, it is purely by chance. We are not getting people who were themselves so thrilled by astronomy or biology or algebra (and there are such people) that they wanted to do it at university — and then who wanted to go back into the classroom and teach it to others. We are getting people who for various reasons are taking the job of teaching mathematics and/or science, but who have no background training. And of course, not necessarily any passion or deep commitment to science.
That Arkansas teacher was on the stand because, as the great geneticist Theodosius Dobzhansky used to say: “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.” In other words, let’s teach about the cell and the parts of the plants. Who gives a damn about whether everything started six thousand years ago or fifteen billion years ago?
This, I have discovered (and the ultimate credit goes back to Texas, which, God knows has got its own troubles with Creationists) is one of the big things that the science-educator professors are trying to address on my campus. They are now insisting that all would-be science teachers have a joint major, one in education and the other in a science or mathematics. This means that the undergraduates are having to take a lot more science and mathematics than before and that some of what they are taking has to be upper-level. No more meeting the qualifications with just first and second year courses.
What our people are trying to do is to get our students hooked on mathematics or science. Make them identify with the field and want to contribute to it — if not as researchers then as teachers of the next generation. Make them care about mathematics or physics or chemistry or biology for their own sakes. Then send them out into the world.
Will any of this work? Ten or 20 years down the road, will we look back and think it a success? I guess no one knows for sure, but it does seem very much worthwhile. It may be that what I am telling readers is stuff that they know very well. I can only say that after 45 years as a professor and with five kids having gone through high school, I am finding how little I know about educating educators. If there are other things I should know, feel free to contact me, and periodically I will make sure that it all gets passed on. I don’t know about you, but the last year’s battle in Washington to get any kind of health-care bill passed has left me really depressed. It is good to know that some things in America are working for the benefit of those to whom we have such great obligations.
20 Responses to Science for Science Teachers
parkiso - January 13, 2010 at 11:35 am
As an economist and a chemist and someone who teaches potential teachers and someone who was appalled at what was “taught” when my kids were in High School, I share your concerns over the lack of qualifications (at least in the past in Indiana). There is a joke – what is the first name of every economics teacher in Indiana – answer is Coach. Indiana is TRYING to fix this problem, but given tenure and time and inertia,it is not happening as quickly as I would like.
suomynona - January 13, 2010 at 6:54 pm
Having recently started teaching more ‘substantive’ (field-specific) stuff after being defaulted to teaching comp and technical writing as a lit. PhD student (nothing ‘unsubstantive’ about these fields themselves; it’s just that I don’t do research in them at all), I’m beginning to learn just how much research impacts teaching. So many of our teacher training and teacher cert. models seem to focus on teaching as its own thing, as though having knowledge and skills in the material being taught is secondary to learning about ‘teaching’ as such. But I’m finding now more than ever that the stuff I research and write about, which has little if any practical or market value outside of academia, which produces tracts that will never be read, in some cases not even by people in my own field, shapes–crucially–much of what I teach, and how I teach it. This is so important politically for all academics, perhaps especially those in the ‘useless’ fields, to answer questions about our value in real terms.
aronsbarron - January 14, 2010 at 9:02 am
sss
zizzer - January 14, 2010 at 9:07 am
“Obviously this law violated the First Amendment separation of church and state”Please cite the portion of the First Amendment that 1) defines “separation of church and state,” and 2) applies to state-sponsored institutions. Let’s get real. The Capital Building was used for religous services for years.Regardless of what some activist court has ruled, the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment applies ONLY to Congress, and in fact states that “CONGRESS shall make NO LAW respecting an establishment of religion, or PROHIBITING the free exercise thereof.” And the Tenth Amendment states, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.” So if the people of Arkansas want to declare Southern Baptist as it’s state religion and base their educational system on the Bible, they may.
12071647 - January 14, 2010 at 9:08 am
I’ve grown very cynical regarding these STEM efforts because no organization really wants to fund them. Personally, I’m in a Biology department at a Research I university. First, students don’t pay big $$$ to go to private universities, motivated by seeking teaching jobs that pay half the salary they paid in tuition, so private research universities roles in education are minimal. Second, research-focused institutions focus on grant-getting and patent-producing research (one and the same). Areas like my discipline, ecology, have 5% funding rates at NSF, and ecology allocates very little to my subdiscipline, theoretical evolutionary ecology (No, it’s math!; No, it’s evolution!; No, where’s the experiment?). My university provides me just a couple hundred dollars a year, and, even while publishing more than 20 papers over 5 years, my dozen proposals since 2001 have all been rejected. I can’t afford to travel to meetings, abandoned math-based biology entirely, and I’m not alone. Meanwhile, my university pays a combined salary of $5 million per year to the basketball and football coaches, subsidizing athletics to the tune of $15 million per year. We’re talking thousands of dollars of potential faculty research support spent on athletics, not STEM, let alone humanities, arts, literature, etc. Now comes along noise about the need for STEM, but there’s no funds from any level of the country’s “education system” to support faculty doing non-commercial research. As I said, I’ve become cynical.
major_ray - January 14, 2010 at 9:24 am
As a creationist, I cannot believe that you off-springs are that unintelligent. This rules against evolutionary theory. Creationism is science and not just a religion! You people categorize it as religion just like you classified me as a Negro. That did not stop me! Creation Science is not going away! As a retired chemistry researcher (Ph.D.) and college executive, I will do all in my power to spread creationism throughout society, including the cages where some of your ancestors still live. You narrow minded atheists need some serious spiritual enlightenment (that’s science too). Inquiry into matrix engineering by an unseen designer will go on!
osholes - January 14, 2010 at 9:59 am
The right wing nuts and IDiots never miss a comment opportunity. Are they paid to do this?First the Constitution: The establishment clause is the key in the first amendment and the courts have made it clear that no one religion may be established as the official religion anywhere in the USA. Go to Iran and see how that works for you.As for creationism, it is not remotely rational much less scientific. it is locked into a set of texts that were never intended as historical documents. Creationism expends great energy ignoring or pretending to debunk evidence because the evidence does not support any of their claims. While the evidence continues to mount, the creationists become increasingly strident and increasingly irrelevant. If you are unwilling to change your single conclusion, then you cannot claim to be rational in any way. Creationism is religious dogma, not science, not reason, not logic, not anything. Go back to your caves and see how that works for you.
sherrysoutherland - January 14, 2010 at 10:04 am
As the Co-Directors of the teacher preparation program mentioned in the article, FSU-Teach, we would like to highlight Dr. Ruse’s description of our intent “What our people are trying to do is to get our students hooked on mathematics or science”. Indeed, we want future teachers to be knowledgeable about and engaged and motivated by science and mathematics. FSU-Teach understands those features to be essential (if not sufficient) to produce effective teachers. Just a couple of points of clarification, FSU-Teach is a joint effort by the Colleges of Arts & Science and Education here at FSU, as we recognize that the preparation of effective teachers is a shared responsibility. Too, our students will graduate with one degree and two majors (the primary major in their content area and the secondary major in secondary science or mathematics teaching).
educationfrontlines - January 14, 2010 at 10:28 am
Prof. Ruse’s fine piece does an excellent job of stressing the critical need for content-first in teacher training, and in the context of the creationist debate. To have detailed the Establishment Clause rulings would have made it a less-effective essay. Here is chapter and verse:0 1963 Abington vs. Schempp: Any public school study of the Bible/religion must be in an objective non-religious program of study o 1968 Epperson vs. Arkansas: States cannot prevent the teaching of evolution.o 1970 Smith vs. Mississippi: States cannot prohibit use of textbooks that include evolution.o 1971 Lemon vs. Kurtzman: Statutes in this area must have a secular purpose and not foster excessive government entanglement.o 1973 CPERL vs. Nyquist: Establishment Clause does not forbid mention of religion, just promotion/inhibition.o 1973 Moore vs. Gaston Co.: Teachers may respond openly and honestly to students’ questions on their views. o 1975 Wilson vs. Board of Ed.: Use of religiously objectional textbooks does not violate Establishment Clause. o 1982 McLean vs. Arkansas: States cannot mandate “balanced treatment.” o 1985 Breen vs. Runkel: Public school teachers cannot promote religion while teaching.o 1987 Edwards vs. Aguillard: States cannot require “equal time” for creation science when evolution is taught. o 1987 Mozert vs. Hawkins Co.: Use of religiously objectionable textbooks does not violate free exercise clause.o 1990 Webster vs. New Lenox: School districts can prohibit teaching of creationism. o 1994 Peloza vs. Capistrano: Schools can require teachers to teach evolution.o 2005 Kitzmiller vs. Dover: Teaching intelligent design violates the Establishment Clause and is a “science stopper.”Both evolution and Establishment Clause school law are far more robust than some readers acknowledge. John Richard Schrock(a Director of Biology Education training biology teachers in a university Biology Department)
princeton67 - January 14, 2010 at 1:26 pm
As a high-school teacher in rural Georgia, whenever I encountered “creationism” or “intelligent design” from a student, parent, school board member, or preacher, I would simply ask for an experiment that my students could conduct, and conduct again, with the same results, that would elevate either of these ideas from belief through hypothesis to theory. None was ever offered. These beliefs may be true, but until they involve petri dishes, Bunsen burners, microscopes, charts, observations, etc., (like, say, changes in fruit flies, viruses, or molds), they remain philosophies, not science.
goxewu - January 14, 2010 at 2:34 pm
Methinks zizzer (#4) has been doing a little too much zzzzzing in the Constitutional law class.First, what is legally “Constitutional” are all laws–Federal, state, county and municipal–current in force and not having been declared by a standing decision by a state or Federal court decision.Second, “CONGRESS shall make NO LAW respecting an establishment of religion, or PROHIBITING the free exercise thereof,” has been interpreted by various still-standing court decisions over the years as meaning NO legislature–including state, county and municipal legislatures– shall make a law respecting the establishment of a relgion.” And “establishment of a religion” has been interpreted by those same court decision to mean, with a few relatively relatively harmless exceptions (public Christmas trees, benedictions at public events, etc.), no government favoritism concerning any religion.This means, third, that the claim that “if the people of Arkansas want to declare Southern Baptist as it’s state religion and base their educational system on the Bible, they may” is totally incorrect. They can try, they may even get such a law in effect for a while, but it would be so clearly unconstitutional, and doomed to be invalidated by the first court in which it lands, that the Arkansas legislature would almost certainly recognize that the effort to pass such a law would be a waste of time and money.Note: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people,” applies to those things not already covered by the Constitution AND the aggregate court decisions which interpret the Constitution in regard to specific cases. Example: The power to grant drivers’ licenses is reserved to the states, but any state law, say an Arkansas one requiring that one be a Southern Baptist in order to obtain a driver’s license, would quickly be declared unconstitutional.
goxewu - January 14, 2010 at 2:38 pm
Sorry. In pragraph two: “…not having been declared unconstitutional…” In paragraph three: …”those same court decisions [plural]…” Zizzer’s not what you’d call a close reader, but just in case…
lelandjordan - January 14, 2010 at 2:42 pm
When I received my BS in Education at the Univ of Fla in 1961, I completed either 21 or 24 SH in mathematics, 18 SH in physics, 8 SH in Chemistry, and none I recall in biology. I was certificated to teach math and science and did teach mathematics and for one and one-half years. The military draft brought on a career shift.I have been shocked to learn in subsequent years that people with relatively little mathematics studies have been “teaching” mathematics in secondary schools. My education courses were offered by the College of Education, my mathematics and sciences were offered by the College of Arts and Sciences and my fellow students in those classes were majoring in mathematics, engineering, and science.FSU appears to be turning essentially to the model followed at UF in the 1950′s; hopefully other universities also will do so.Leland G. Jordan, DBA, CGFMProfessor Emeritus, Christopher Newport UniversityFlorida ’61; Air Force Inst. of Tech ’72; GWU ’86
lowenstm - January 14, 2010 at 3:52 pm
I can’t substantiate this, it’s just a conjecture, but I wonder sometimes if we’re so weak at science as a population precisely because we have to accommodate a substantial number of folks who are creationists, and you can’t really embrace modern biology, chemistry, physics, or geology from that standpoint. So I’m suggesting we’re not creationists because we’re bad at science, we’re bad at science because we can’t really talk about it fully without offending too many people.What Florida State and U Texas are doing sounds very good, but isn’t it remarkable that it’s necessary? States shouldn’t license anyone to teach a subject who hasn’t taken a substantial amount of college coursework in the subject.
zizzer - January 14, 2010 at 5:40 pm
osholes – You completely bypassed my point when you invoked “the courts”. Please quote the portion of the First Amendment that applies to ANY BODY OTHER THAN CONGRESS.goxewu – So if it’s been on the books for a while, it doesn’t matter if it contradicts the Constitution? Please. If that were true we’d still have slavery. If what you contend is true, then why did almost every state constitution of the original thirteen and other later ones specify that to hold high office in that state one must be of the Christian faith? And many specifically prohibited Roman Catholics and Jews from holding office. Why did Congress comission Bibles “for our Schools, & families, & for the publick Worship of God in our Churches”?
suomynona - January 14, 2010 at 10:04 pm
Zizzer, If a law has been on the books for a while and it contradicts the Constitution, it doesn’t matter UNTIL the law is overturned in the courts (as goxewu correctly suggests). For example, there have been (and probably still are) states that still legally forbid people of different races to marry well after the 14 amendment (equal protection) was passed in the late 19th century. These laws remain on the books until they’re challenged; but of course every time a law so clearly in violation of the constitution is challenged, it’s quickly overturned. This is why if slavery were still legal in any part of the US, someone who tried to enslave another person would be swiftly denied and punished in the courts. You say that if this were true we’d still have slavery? BS! There are many reasons why we don’t have slavery, among them few people are actually immoral and stupid enough (surprisingly) to try it. For many of the same reasons it’s not common for people today to try to legally contest interracial relationships, even when certain states may still have antiquated laws that technically forbid them. If, as it would be with modern-day slavery attempts, some idiot cop or politician or wayward bigot tried to bring legal action against an interracial married couple in a state in which this was technically forbidden, the couple would appeal to the Constitution and would win the dispute quickly and with ease. Your understanding of how the law works in this country is frighteningly contorted.
zizzer - January 15, 2010 at 8:42 am
suomynona,You have more or less made my point for me. The legislators and the courts in this country do NOT follow the Constitution. We even have Supreme Court Justices who consider foreign and international law over our own Constitution. The system is sorely broken. Our government does so many things every day that are not constitutional because some yahoo or group of yahoos said that they are legal. If it is unconstitutional, it’s illegal. The courts are supposed to uphold this principle, but often they do not; either because no one brings the challenge, or because the jurists have some agenda and ignore the constitution all together. This is the same kind of thinking that kept slavery legal for so long and has made abortion legal. These “brilliant” minds that play with false enigmas like “personhood” keep such illegal injustices going under the protection of “The Law.”
suomynona - January 15, 2010 at 9:57 am
Zizzer,It is by Constitutional prescription that our legal system works this way. The system is not ‘broken’ in this way. The system is Constitutinoal. The Constitution was deliberately designed this way. It is absolutely not the job of the courts to uphold or prescribe Constitutionality on a given issue before Constitutionality is challenged–to do that would be exactly the kind of thing you seem to be worried about–judical activism. But once a case comes before a judge in any court, I’d argue that the track record for upholding the Constitution and Constitutional law is pretty damn good. But we don’t allow the people who are charged with the responsibilty of interpreting the laws to MAKE the laws also, nor do we allow a higher court to preempt the would-be judgment of a lower court with a ‘Constitutional’ interpretation. That would be oligarchical and unconstitutional. The case goes to the court; not the court to the case.Zizzer’s comments are a good example of the problem with this brand of strict Constitutionism on the right today. People expect that the Constitution–or any sentence or narrative, for that matter–can always only be interpreted one way. At the same time they fail to recognize that the Constitution is a dynamic enough document to have prescribed not just a list of rules or commandments, but a rather complicated system for adjudicating conflict and dividing powers. Anytime someone freaks out about something like, say, abortion being ‘unconstitutional’ (whether they disagree with abortion on moral grounds or not), they miss the most important point: that of the rather elegant and impressive Constitutionality of the whole dispute, and the way it’s played out in the legislature and then in the courts. I should also add, as I have before, that the Constitution famously allows for ammendments, of which there have been 27 very significant ones. The Constitution has indeed changed radically over time, ushering in ammendments as late as the 20th century that stipulate our current voting age, establish voting rights for women, and set term limitations on the president. The way the more extreme strict Constitutionalists understand the document, and with the logic they apply, we wouldn’t have had such things. Nevermind the abolition of slavery or the equal protection amendment…
goxewu - January 15, 2010 at 1:37 pm
If there’s such a thing as sleepwalking, zizzzzzzzzzer proves that there’s such a thing as sleeptyping.There was nothing in the Constitution prohibiting slavery until the 13th Ammendment was passed in 1865. Slavery was totally “Constitutional” from 1787 until then.So were laws prohibiting Catholics, Jews, blacks, et al., from holding office–until they were either rendered unconstitutional by an Ammendment or a court interpretation of the Constitution.”So if it’s been on the books for a while, it doesn’t matter if it contradicts the Constitution?” has nothing to do with anything I said. Zizzzzzzzzzer is arguing with himself.What Congress commissioned to be printed has nothing to do with what’s Constitutional.And so on and so on. Suffice it to say that any court or law that doesn’t conform to what zizzzzzzzzzzer thinks is the correct interpretation of the Constitution constitutes “not upholding” the Constitution.
arnoldas - January 18, 2010 at 12:46 pm
No one has mentioned the 14th amendment which makes the first 10 amendments applicable to the states as well as the federal government. No state could now establish a religious test against its citizens to deny them the right to seek or hold public office. Zisser writes as if the 14th amendment did not exist, but it does and renders his arguments irrelevant and irresponsible. This stuff is taught in high school civics and history courses, is it not?