washington

Singer: option of legal challenge.

The National Academy of Sciences, alarmed by what it says is continuing hostility to the teaching of evolution in many school districts in the United States, has produced a glossy guide to advise teachers on how the subject can be best taught.

The guide is designed to help teachers in parts of the country, primarily in the south, where Christian groups have tried to ensure that ‘creation science’ is taught alongside evolution. It says that the Supreme Court rejected that idea in 1987, when it held that a Louisiana decree calling for the “balanced treatment” of the two was unconstitutional.

“We're not saying that teachers can flaunt their state rules,” says Maxine Singer, president of the Carnegie Institution of Washington and one of the guide's authors. “But they could challenge them legally” on the basis of the Supreme Court ruling, she says.

The guide says that the emergence of genetics has made the theory of evolution a central tenet of biology, which teachers cannot choose to ignore. Many teachers mistakenly assume that evolution has little to do with science as it is practised today, says Singer. “A few years ago, evolution was not of major interest to molecular biologists,” she says. “But now it is.”

According to academy officials, a few states have education policies that require the teaching of creationism. Schools are usually administered, however, by counties and problems arise in all regions of the United States.

Donald Kennedy of Stanford University, who chaired the group of 13 authors, declines to estimate how many teachers are intimidated by such policies.

“If you listen to enough teachers you become persuaded that this is a serious problem,” Kennedy says.