Sir

The scientific community must push forward new curriculum ideas before more US school boards like those in Kansas and Kentucky attempt to deny their students a proper science education1. Rapid changes in the world economy and in social structures are prompting the need for individuals who can adjust and thrive in a changing world. These challenges require educational innovation. Yet according to international test scores, US public schools are stagnating.

In 1963, the view emerged that “the rate of change in the society in which we live forces us to redefine how we shall educate a new generation”2. Environmental problems, population growth, violence and growing suburbanization were placing increasing demands on resources. These demands prompted the creation of a curriculum designed to use education, rather than government regulation and penalties, to improve the human condition2.

The result was Macos (Man: a course of study), a school programme integrating anthropology, biology and the latest concepts of educational psychology. Developed by teachers and specialists in the areas studied, with the help of a grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF), it stayed in use for more than a decade. At its peak the Macos curriculum was taught in 47 states and 1,700 schools, and was hailed as significant educational progress3. Forty years later, the same social and economic problems remain. Perhaps it is time for the social and biological sciences again to be made central to a multidisciplinary curriculum based on complex systems of human societies and behaviour.

Macos attempted to achieve social change by the use of anthropological and biological models designed “to help children understand what it means to be human”2 by addressing basic questions about humanity. Five goals were established: to give pupils respect for and confidence in the powers of their own minds; to use this to give them power to think about the human condition and society; to provide workable models to analyse the nature of society and the human condition; to impart respect for the capacities and humanity of the human race as a species; and to provide a sense of the unfinished business of human evolution2.

Macos was a daily 40–45-minute lesson for fifth- and sixth-grade students (aged 9 to 11). The course included studying the life and culture of the Netsilik Eskimos and their habitat. By examining the biological and anthropological systems of the Eskimos, children could examine their own culture and habitat4. The course was discontinued in 1976 by the NSF, prompted by Senator John Conlan (Republican, Arizona), who objected to it because it dealt with topics such as evolution, reproduction and violence5.

In essence, Macos was a beginning course in philosophy, using several disciplines to address basic questions of humanity, focusing on creating complex questions rather than answering them. Fact acquisition was secondary to establishing a foundation on which learning and thinking would grow. While the idea of creating questions instead of delivering facts may be frowned on by proponents of standardized tests, it is essential for teaching children to think.

An educational curriculum needs to be designed today that has the same character and purpose as Macos, but based on broader, complex systems, with computer databases and the Internet used as integral tools by teachers. The development of the curriculum must be a collaborative effort by leaders of several disciplines to provide a comprehensive and successful educational programme6.

Scientists must not sit back and watch movements towards irrationality, such as the judgements in Kansas and Kentucky in 1999. A united scientific community can provide an impetus for future social change by introducing and supporting a strong science curriculum based on complex systems.