Ohio Citizens for Science Responds to
"Controversial Issues" Template

Ohio Citizens for Science has prepared a statement regarding the draft "Controversial Issues" template:

"Controversial Issues" Response (pdf)

Here is the Executive Summary of the statement:

The Ohio Board of Education's proposed Controversy Template is incoherent if, as its major proponent has stated, it will have teachers and students "challenge everything." It is impossible to challenge everything in each school class; to even attempt such a thing would result in chaos and no learning. Clearly the template is in fact the latest step in ongoing efforts to orchestrate a religiously motivated attack on the theory of evolution (as detailed below). That explains why its content was kept secret as long as possible. While science relies constantly on genuine critical analysis, it does not use denigrating debate tools based on political propaganda and ill-informed by evidence. The Board must call the question and vote down this transparent ploy.

The statement continues

After repeated denials of its existence and only under repeated exercises of Ohio's Public Documents law, the Ohio Department of Education has released a draft of its "Controversial Issues Framework" also referred to as a "Controversial Issues Template," called hereafter, Controversy Template.

The proposal seems innocuous upon first reading by someone unfamiliar with its context, history, and proponents. Given that the proposal will be discussed and possibly voted on by the BoardÕs Achievement Committee on Monday 11 September 2006i, Ohio Citizens for Science provides here an initial evaluation of the proposal. We also try to provide some of the history of this ongoing effort and the issues contained therein.

Ohio Citizens for Science urges the Ohio Board of Education to accomplish the following at its meeting scheduled for 11-12 September 2006:

Achievement Committee co-Chair Mr. Jim Craig or Rev. Michael Cochran must call the question directed to the attention of the Committee by the entire Board in February 2006 in Resolution 31 -- the Board's decision to remove "Critical Analysis of Evolution" language from Ohio's Academic Standards. The Board charged the Achievement Committee to "consider whether the deleted model lesson, Benchmark H, and Indicator should be replaced by a different model lesson, benchmark and indicator, and if so, to present any recommendation to the entire State Board for adoption."

Read the full statement for more information.

"Controversial Issues" Response (pdf)