The Word ‘Evolution’ Has Become a Firestorm in Georgia

ATLANTA —  Georgia’s state school superintendent on Thursday defended deleting the word “evolution” from a biology curriculum proposed for high school teachers, calling it “a buzzword that causes a lot of negative reactions.”

The plan, which also omits topics such as Charles Darwin’s life, fossil evidence and the emergence of single-celled microorganisms, has angered educators. Under the proposed curriculum, Georgia educators would no longer be required to devote much time and effort to teaching evolution.

Superintendent Kathy Cox said the word “evolution” could keep some people from considering the new curriculum. She added that the changes were meant to take pressure off teachers “on the front lines.”

If the curriculum is adopted, most teachers will skim over the subject, which remains unwelcome in many parts of the state, educators warned Thursday.

“This is a real infringement on the freedom of teaching, and it has serious implications,” said David Bechler, head of the biology department at Valdosta State University.

The state’s science curriculum specialist, Stephen Pruitt, said the word “evolution” would not be banned in the classroom. He recalled debates about evolution when he taught science, and said he hoped the new plan would allow students to draw their own conclusions about the evidence for evolution. “I personally believe we are dissecting the theory of evolution to look at the pieces of it,” Pruitt said.

By Thursday, almost 1,000 people, including parents, teachers and scientists, had signed an online petition demanding restoration of the omitted sections. Cox said that the department was seeking public comment on the proposed curriculum and that final revisions could be made before the State Board of Education votes on it in May.

A handful of states avoid using the word “evolution” in teaching plans, replacing it with euphemisms such as “biological adaptation” or “change over time.” Georgia, however, would be the first state to remove the word “evolution” from teaching plans after including it for years, according to the National Center for Science Education, a California organization that tracks anti-evolutionary teaching.

The revised curriculum was a major initiative for Cox, a Republican elected to the post in 2002. For six months, panels of educators met to fine-tune the new curriculum and agreed to adopt most of the topics recommended by the American Assn. for the Advancement of Science.

But the final version eliminated much detail about the origin of life, including Gregor Mendel’s identification of genes, the appearance of primitive life forms 4 billion years ago, and the long-term dynamics of evolution. In its place is a statement listing five “historical scientific models of change” that includes the sole mention of Darwin. The word “evolution,” used nine times in the original document, disappears entirely, and is replaced by the phrase “change over time.”

Bechler, who participated in developing the curriculum, said he was astonished to discover that the passages had been eliminated. He said cutting the curriculum could seriously hurt the understanding of science.

There are, however, large sections of Georgia where evolution has never been fully accepted.

Susan McKinney, who teaches biology to high school students in Crisp County, said she had never believed Earth could have come into existence without a divine hand. Neither do her students, and neither do her colleagues, said McKinney, who has taught for 26 years.

McKinney said she believed in natural selection, but when her course touched on the fossil record and single-celled organisms believed to be among the first life forms on earth -- information she considers a “tentative hypothesis” -- she skims over it, recommending that students study the material independently if they wish.

“I can tell you, being in rural south Georgia, that it’s kind of loose where you go and how far you go” in the teaching of evolution, said McKinney. “We don’t go all the way down to how we came out of the primordial ooze.”

Georgia has lagged behind other states in the teaching of evolution. In a 2000 report, retired physicist Lawrence Lerner classified Georgia among the 13 states that had received an F, failing “so thoroughly to teach evolution as to render their standards totally useless.”

Much of the trend can be attributed to social pressure, said Gerald Skoog, former president of the National Science Teachers Assn. Statewide standards can insulate teachers, he said. “Teachers would tell me, ‘It offers a shield of protection when I can point to the standards and indicate that evolution needs to be covered,’” Skoog said.

In Atlanta, an area that draws hi-tech workers and out-of-state academics, one scientist admitted his primary reaction was acute embarrassment.

“I hope we don’t have to change the word ‘chemistry’ to ‘the movement of molecules across space’ next,” said John Avise, a genetics professor at the University of Georgia. “I’ll have to rewrite a lot of my texts.”