{"id":204,"date":"2007-05-02T07:02:52","date_gmt":"2007-05-02T11:02:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=204"},"modified":"2008-08-05T13:09:10","modified_gmt":"2008-08-05T17:09:10","slug":"opening-a-can-of-worms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=204","title":{"rendered":"Opening a can of worms"},"content":{"rendered":"

Maybe they have their hearts in the right place, but I think Florida lawmakers are opening a can of worms with new legislation that will allow “high performing” school districts to cut loose of many state controls<\/a>. I can see the point of giving these school districts free reign because they “must be doing something right.” However, the point made about larger districts never being in the running for this honor is valid and outweighs the pros. And then there is this interesting point:<\/p>\n

Allowing school districts to choose textbooks that are not on a state-approved list prompted fears. One lawmaker said the proposal would allow schools to buy science books espousing the theory of intelligent design, a teaching that credits the creation of the world to an intelligent being rather than evolution, while remaining silent on subjects such as the Holocaust or black history.<\/p>\n

Backers said that was unlikely, however, because for schools to keep their “high performing” status, students must excel on the FCAT, which is aligned to the state’s curriculum standards, which do not include subjects such as intelligent design.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I wonder who that unnamed lawmaker is. It seems that he or she is wise to some things that go on out here in the real world, which is outstanding!<\/p>\n

I don’t think a possible shoddy textbook is the most important reason to tank the legislation, but does bring up an interesting point. Consider the argument that only smaller school districts would get the proposed freedoms. I think that it would be much more likely that the smaller districts run the greater risk for taking things like intelligent design seriously. All it takes is some pressure applied by wily anti-science groups during a school board election to screw things up.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Maybe they have their hearts in the right place, but I think Florida lawmakers are opening a can of worms with new legislation that will allow “high performing” school districts to cut loose of many state controls. I can see … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-3i","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1859,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1859","url_meta":{"origin":204,"position":0},"title":"Hijinks could ensue","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"April 21, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"A bill is working its way through our state legislature that will turn over review, approval and selection of instructional materials to local school districts. Currently, instructional materials are reviewed and approved by the state and then districts must spend at least half of their instructional materials budgets on state\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 11 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 11 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1859#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":926,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=926","url_meta":{"origin":204,"position":1},"title":"Press Release: “Critical Analysis” bill","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"February 27, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Florida Citizens for Science Press Release: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Critical Analysis\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Bill Undermines Florida Science Education Florida Citizens for Science is disappointed that Senator Stephen Wise has chosen to waste the valuable time of his fellow legislators and possibly deepen a school district\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s financial difficulties by filing a bill challenging the teaching of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "\"ID Creationism\" bills '09"","block_context":{"text":"\"ID Creationism\" bills '09","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=27"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2901,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=2901","url_meta":{"origin":204,"position":2},"title":"Marion County to review and approve textbooks on their own","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"September 24, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"There's a new wrinkle in the Florida instructional materials world. We already know that the Florida Department of Education is in the process of reviewing and approving new science textbooks that school districts could then pick from to purchase for their schools. We already know that two new laws could\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Textbooks"","block_context":{"text":"Textbooks","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=26"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":398,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=398","url_meta":{"origin":204,"position":3},"title":"Creationism is taught in Florida?!","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"January 18, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"An article in today's Florida Today focuses on what evolution in the public schools means to Brevard County. The majority of quotes in the story are outstanding, and, quite frankly, reality based. Here's a sample. Superintendent Richard DiPatri said the change wouldn't make a difference in Brevard Public Schools, where\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "In the News"","block_context":{"text":"In the News","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2318,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=2318","url_meta":{"origin":204,"position":4},"title":"Textbook trouble: history and sex ed","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 21, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"The Lee County school board will hear from concerned citizens this week about the content of history textbooks under consideration for adoption. Board documents show nine objections have been filed for a sixth-grade world history text published by Pearson. Among the complaints for the book, called \u00e2\u20ac\u0153my (sic) World History,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=2318#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2397,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=2397","url_meta":{"origin":204,"position":5},"title":"Florida Citizens for Science News Release","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"January 11, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"News Release Lawmakers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Instructional Materials Proposal: Costly Headache for School Boards Jan 11, 2016 Florida Citizens for Science Florida Citizens for Science opposes companion bills filed in the Florida House and Senate, HB899 and SB1018, both entitled \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Instructional Materials for K-12 Public Education.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d We assert that these bills are in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Instructional Materials bills '16"","block_context":{"text":"Instructional Materials bills '16","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=31"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}