Courtroom Says Yes, Classroom Says No To Evolutionism

Let’s begin by going back to the year of 1925 in the United States. A court case titled The State of Tennessee v. Scopes. More commonly known as the Scopes Monkey Trial.

John Scopes was a high school biology teacher in Dayton, Tennessee. Scopes’ intention was to create publicity by teaching evolution in the classroom. This was prohibited by another Tennessee law, called the Butler Act. The Butler Act was enstated more or less to prevent evolution from being taught in public schools.

On May 18, 1967, the Butler Act was overturned in court, making it no longer valid. The reasoning was that teaching evolution was an act of free speech. Not being allowed to teach it would violate the first amendment.

Getting back to the Scope trial. Scopes was found guilty, but never had to suffer for it whatsoever. Scopes did get his wish; he created much publicity. Science versus religion arguments surface to this present moment.

Creationism was not allowed to be taught in the 1970’s and 1980’s, but a modified version was later allowed. In 2005, intelligent design was disallowed. The Kitzmiller v. Dover case prohibited the teaching of intelligent design. Intelligent design was not considered to be a science, therefore it could not be taught.

Here is where the plot really gets interesting. According to an article which can be viewed on Nature.com, a great majority of teachers would not advocate the teaching of evolutionism.

Although the the state curricula strongly encourages evolutionism, teachers are quite uneasy to touch the idea of evolution. This discovery is very much a surprise. One representative replied: “It’s like a math teacher not believing in algebra.”

Eric Plutzer, from Pennsylvania State University, along with Michael Berkman, also of Pennsylvania State University, conducted the study. The two discovered that at least 60% of teachers were teaching a watered down version of evolution in the class.

In reality, the state content had no bearing on how the teachers taught science in the classroom. So the idea is that the students only know evolution on the tests, and they really didn’t have to believe it.

Creationism may not be dominant in the classroom, but it has proved very difficult to totally erase the controversial concept.