HEADLINE: Evolution's next step in Kansas: Ballot box Voters join in the
fray over the teaching of Darwinism

BYLINE: Mary Beth Marklein

DATELINE: JOHNSON COUNTY, Kan.

JOHNSON COUNTY, Kan.  Following Board of Education elections in these
parts is usually about as exciting as watching corn grow, voters in this
suburban  Kansas City area say. But when the state board approved scienceteaching
standards in August that dropped references to evolution, this year's
election season was destined to be lively.
    Until this issue arose, "I didn't even know there was a school board,"
says Paul Rothberg of Overland Park, who has two kids in the Blue Valley
Unified School District here. Now he's noticing candidates' yard signs,
the mention of evolution by congressional candidates and the headlines in the
papers.
    Not since the Scopes Monkey Trial, argued 75 years ago this week on
the lawn of a Tennessee courthouse, has the public debate over Charles
Darwin's theory of evolution been so hot. There have been other attacks, including
the Alabama Board of Education's adoption in 1995 of a disclaimer for
biology textbooks that says evolution is unproven and the removal of the
word "evolution" from Nebraska's science guidelines in 1999.
     But it was the Kansas Board of Education's 64 vote to drop evolution
as an area of required science instruction that captured the world's
attention, inspiring campaigntrail questions for presidential candidates,
Land of Oz jokes on late-night TV, and scathing criticism from the
National Academy of Sciences and other science and education groups.
     Kansas board chairwoman Linda Holloway, who voted for the standards,
says the media blew the thing way out of proportion. "People criticize
us  me  saying, 'You give the state a bad name.' But the first word that
went out on the wire was wrong  that Kansas banned evolution."
     Indeed, it remains legal to teach evolution in public schools. But
the standards changed the state's guidance on teaching it. For example, one
eighth-grade standard says children should learn that "over time, genetic
variation acted upon by natural selection has brought variations in
populations. This is termed microevolution."
    A draft prepared by a state committee originally said: "Biological
evolution, gradual changes of characteristics of organisms over many
generations, has brought variations in populations."     One critical
group says the board's use of "microevolution" acknowledges that aspects of
evolution can occur over short periods but leaves out any reference to
evolution over longer periods, which can lead to new species.
    And because references to evolution are left out, the subject won't
appear on state assessment tests, creating a disincentive for teachers to
cover it and an opportunity to introduce alternative viewpoints.  While
several districts vow to keep the subject in the curriculum, many
educators and parents worry that the deemphasis will erode the quality of science
education.
     Conservative Christians and other supporters of the deemphasis on
evolution view the board's action as a victory for academic freedom and
local control of schools. "It's like being on the cutting edge," says
parent Celtie Johnson of Prairie Village. Kansas "is brave enough to seek
the truth."
    So important is the issue to Johnson, who has never before been
involved in politics, that she is campaigning for Holloway's reelection.
    Holloway says she is optimistic about the outcome of her Aug. 1
Republican primary. But of the 10 seats on the board, five are on the
ballot, and three of them belong to incumbents who voted for the
standards. So evolution activists are counting on voter turnout to change the board's
ideological mix to one that would adopt an earlier draft of the standards
that emphasized the importance of evolution.
    A coalition of organizations supporting evolution went all out last
week, sponsoring a statewide array of events culminating in a reenactment
of the Scopes trial featuring actors Ed Asner and Shirley Knight, both
Kansas natives, among others. And because Republican primaries typically
decide elections in this conservative state, those supporting evolution
are urging Democrats to switch parties to boost their chances of winning. Says
Caroline McKnight, head of a group trying to oust the antievolutionists:
"Democracy got us into this, and democracy will get us out."
    Even so, the long-simmering national debate remains far from resolved.
Any discussion of the subject quickly grows emotional, raising issues of
morality, ethical responsibility and other implications for the meaning
and purpose of life. Consider Rep. Tom DeLay, R-Texas, who last summer
ventured that tragedies like the Columbine High School shootings would continue as
long as "our school systems teach the children that they are nothing but
glorified apes who are evolutionized out of some primordial soup of mud."
    That same idea was central to the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial, in which
teacher John Scopes was convicted of violating a state law when he
discussed evolution in a high school biology class. As Scopes' famed
defense attorney, Clarence Darrow, propounded: "Scopes isn't on trial.
Civilization is on trial!"
    But unlike the Scopes trial, which pitted religion against science,
the Kansas standards mention neither God nor creationism, which holds that God
created humans whole, according to Genesis.
    Many evolution skeptics are trying to recast the controversy as a
matter of good vs. bad science, promoting a concept they call "intelligent
design" as a better explanation for human existence.
    Much of the work of intelligent-design researchers aims to refute
Darwin's ideas about biological evolution and natural selection. They
suggest that some aspects of nature are so complex and improbable that
they could come only from an intelligent source.
     Proponents don't identify the agent but also don't rule out God. And
they note that creationism is consistent with intelligent design  a point
that might raise philosophical problems among theorists but isn't
necessarily relevant in citizen efforts to keep evolution from dominating
the biology curriculum.
    From the intelligent-design movement, advanced by scholars at
respected universities, is emerging what could become a battle in science research.
     The anti-evolutionist ideas are routinely slammed by the overwhelming
majority of scientists, who argue  emphatically  that evolution theory is
so well documented as to be an observable fact.
    The intelligent-design premise "is like suggesting the stork theory as
an alternative medical explanation for how babies are born," says Leonard
Krishtalka, director of the University of Kansas' natural history museum
in Lawrence. Faculty members at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, were so
incensed this year when they learned a center to study intelligent design
had been set up on the Baptist campus that they voted to shut it down.
(The center is scheduled to be reviewed by a committee of peers.)
     Though there is little consensus in the debate, both sides agree that
biology education in public schools is inadequate. They base that on
recent polls suggesting that 50% to 80% of the U.S. (and Canadian, in some cases)
population think it's OK to teach kids both literal creationism and
organic evolution.
    But just as they can look at a dinosaur bone and reach different
conclusions, those who are comfortable with evolution and those who aren't
interpret the survey results differently.
    Anti-evolutionists tend to see the numbers as proof that schools ought
to be able to teach alternatives to Darwin if parents want them to. And
evolutionists see the numbers as evidence that they haven't explained the
science thoroughly enough.
     There's one other meeting of the minds in all the fuss: a sense that
democracy will be better off for having had the evolution debate, however
heated.
    "We Americans, we're a disputational group, but we tend to abide by
the majority rule," says Kansas school board member Bill Wagnon, a Democrat
from Topeka who voted against the standards and will face a Republican in
the general election. Whatever the outcome, he says, "we're going to have
to live with the consequences."

GRAPHIC: Monkey business: The University of Kansas' naturalhistory museum
in Lawrence is hosting events centered on the Scopes trial. (Debating
dinosaurs and design, 10D)