Kansas Tornado: The 1999 Science Curriculum Standards Battle [Paperback]

Paul Ackerman (Author), Bob Williams (Author), John D. Morris (Foreword)

Product Details

• Paperback: 95 pages
• Publisher: Institute For Creation Research (1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0932766609
• ISBN-13: 978-0932766601
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.3 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,022,295 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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4.0 out of 5 stars AN EARLY SUMMARY OF THE KANSAS STATE TEXTBOOK CONTROVERSY, October 21, 2011

By 

Steven H. Propp (Sacramento, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Kansas Tornado: The 1999 Science Curriculum Standards Battle (Paperback)

Paul Ackerman is a psychology professor at Wichita State University; he has also written It's a Young World After All, In God's Image After All: How Psychology Supports Biblical Creationism, etc.

In August 1999 the Kansas State Board of Education voted to remove all mention of evolution, the age of the earth, or the origin of the universe from the state's science curriculum; in 2001, the Board reversed this decision, ruling that instruction of all those topics was mandatory and that they would appear on standardized tests. Then in 2005 the Board approved a draft of science curriculum standards that mandated equal time for the theories of "evolution" and "intelligent design"---but in 2007 the Board voted to reject these amended standards.

This 1999 book was written at the beginning of the controversy. ICR Direction John Morris wrote in the Foreword, "Into this fray stepped the Kansas State School Board. As aggressively evolutionary teaching standards were proposed for Kansas schools, the School Board rejected them... Eventually they produced a similar document which took (evolutionary) religion out and returned good science to the classroom... No creation ideas were included, certainly no Biblical ideas... Predictably, naturalistic evolutionists reacted irrationally and emotionally... What started as a refreshing breeze has turned into a tornado, devastating the errant thought system of evolutionism along the way."

Here are some additional quotations from the book:

"...the State Writing Committee tells us, in their macroevolution benchmark, students must 'understand' that 'evolution by natural selection is a broad, unifying theoretical framework in biology.' (Michael) Behe's research (e.g., in Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution) reveals that this is not true in any rigorous scientific sense but only in the sense of some philosophical naturalist wand to wave over the mysteries of life and origins. This is unacceptable! This is what the fuss is all about!" (Pg. 39)
"As you get going (i.e., in your grassroots campaign) do not give your 'grass roots' campaign a name. It is mich harder for your opponents to criticize 'parents' than a group that has labeled itself." (Pg. 60)
"The principle of freedom to 'identify assumption, use critical and logical thinking, and consider alternative explanations' allows participation for teachers and students who are atheistic or theistic, who subscribe to evolution or creation. The principle allows freedom to expose fuzzy or inaccurate definitions that obscure and impede clear scientific thinking rather than facilitate it. This principle precludes indoctrination on the basis of any one religion, philosophy, or dogma." (Pg. 68)