Garrett Mize (photo by Andrew Rogers, Daily Texan Staff)
On the website of the Texas Freedom Network, “africangenesis” comments:
Ed Darrell, I doubt you can trace the failure of Texas schools to the “strengths and weaknesses” language which has been around a couple of decades.
Jonathan Saenz (identified by TFN as “director of legislative affairs for Plano-based Free Market Foundation, the Texas affiliate of James Dobson’s Focus on the Family) and members of the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) made a big deal of this argument. When asked by SBOE members if they had evidence that the language has done damage, the university science instructors and professors replied that they didn’t have the kind of evidence that would come from systematic studies, but they did know from their teaching experience that Texas high school graduates have been very poorly educated on what science is and how it works.
SBOE member Terri Leao -- District 6: Spring, TX
Some witnesses testified that Texas science teachers have been intimidated from teaching science, and several said their HS science teachers had avoided evolution altogether. The “strengths and weaknesses” language is obviously not the exclusive cause of this situation, but it is a key element in maintaining the regime of untruth that evidently has harmed Texas science education over recent decades.
Here’s one example from a student (Garrett Mize, who’s now a junior at UT-Austin):
4 Comments
What is the evidence that the strength and weaknesses language is “a key element in maintaining the regime of untruth”?
I went to your example link, and Garrett Mize did not seem particularly ignorant of evolution nor did he relate evidence that teachers had been intimidated from teaching science. What was that link supposed to be an “example” of?
africangenesis asks
It’s an example of the testimony given in the SBOE meeting by people who have been students and/or science teachers in Texas during the last 20 years. In particular, this one is an example of a student testifying that his HS science teacher had avoided evolution altogether. I am sure that there are students in college who have learned about evolution despite not studying it in high school; but Mize did not demonstrate much knowledge of biology in his testimony, anyway — that’s not what he testified about.
My bad, I was looking at the link to Daily Texan article, not the audio clip. Garrett’s testimony was not very good, he admitted that because the teacher didn’t teach evolution that he “assumed” she was afraid to do so. He didn’t even have heresay evidence, something the teacher said to him or anything.
If evolution is central to biology, what did Garrett do in that class for a year? Perhaps it was something like biochemistry, which is also central to biology, or organ systems or phylogeny, or metabolism or photosynthesis or ecology.
But he wants to claim that weakness language prevents teachers from teaching science.
“africangenesis,” I really do appreciate your latest comment. It warrants a substantial response. I’m not sure when I’ll have a chance to get to that, but I promise that I will.
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