Pharyngula has the details; his pointed letter to the school principal bears quoting (and saving, so you can send a copy to your local educators, should the occasion arise):
I am a college professor. I teach biology at the University of Minnesota, Morris. You may appreciate how dismayed I was to read about the censorship of evolution at your school in the 12 May issue of the Star Tribune.
Every year, we try to recruit the best and brightest students in Minnesota, and we try our best to push them a little farther and teach them the essential and the advanced concepts in our discipline. In biology, the foundation of our science is evolution. This is not in dispute; perhaps you have been told that this is a "controversial" theory, but if so, you have been misled. It's a concept as indispensable to biology as algebra is to mathematics, or grammar to English. We need our incoming students to be as prepared as possible in these subjects.
Mr Sanderson, you are not helping. You are setting education back for your kids.
I don't expect elementary school children to be taught the details of evolution. I think it's entirely reasonable that the curriculum be managed to present appropriate material at an appropriate age. But I also don't expect young children to be taught that a core concept of my discipline is controversial, offensive, frightening, or in need of censorship. Lisa Peters has written a simple, unthreatening children's book and would have presented it in an apt and pleasant manner. Canceling her speaking engagement because she was going to mention something so central to an important science was a mistake.
Please do me a favor, Mr Sanderson, and help your kids out. Next time a "controversial" topic comes up in your school, could you rule in favor of the side of learning and scholarship, rather than reactionary religious hysteria?
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