A few weeks ago I wrote about Oklahoma State Representative Sally Kern, who had submitted a bill to the state legislature that would significantly weaken science education in that state. Basically, the bill would bar teachers from grading students down on science tests because of that student's particular belief. In other words, the student could say the Earth is 6000 years old, and the teacher couldn't fail them. Well, some good news: that bill failed to pass the vote. The bad news? It only failed 7-9. Nearly half the people in the state's Education Committee felt it would be OK (haha) for students to fail to learn actual science, and not be penalized for it. And Kern, the bill's sponsor, will no doubt not take this defeat lying down. She has a long, long history of blatant anti-reality leanings -- she once compared being gay to having cancer -- and I'm sure she'll be proposing some new version of nonsense soon. But there's some hope. Fred Jordan, another member of the Education Committee, said,
"We're opening the door for teachers to kind of say whatever they want to say, whether it's religious issues, creation, evolution. I really feel like we're opening the door to where any and everything can come in."
That is precisely right. So given that statement by Jordan, I'll leave you with this:
Tip o' the knuckle-whacking ruler to Mandy Qualls.
Related posts: - America and India love their antiscience - Oklahoma: One step from doom
