{"id":236,"date":"2007-07-01T15:25:06","date_gmt":"2007-07-01T19:25:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=236"},"modified":"2008-08-05T13:54:40","modified_gmt":"2008-08-05T17:54:40","slug":"update-to-current-yecke-controversy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=236","title":{"rendered":"Update to current Yecke controversy"},"content":{"rendered":"

The following news release was submitted to Florida media.
\nNew Information Points to Dr. Yecke Trying to Revise History<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dr. Cheri Pierson Yecke is apparently trying to revise history and has now been caught in the act. There is a new development in the controversy over a nearly four-year-old quote by Dr. Yecke, K-12 chancellor for Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Department of Education. Research into Dr. Yecke\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s claim that she did not advocate a discredited theory that challenges the theory of evolution revealed evidence to the contrary.<\/p>\n

The quote in question concerns advocating something called intelligent design, which is a discredited challenge to the scientific theory of biological evolution. Dr. Yecke had hired a company called ReputationDefender to scour the Internet for mentions of Dr. Yecke promoting the inclusion of intelligent design in Minnesota\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s public schools in 2003. The company then \u00e2\u20ac\u0153destroys\u00e2\u20ac\u009d these items, according to the company\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s website.<\/p>\n

Dr. Wesley Elsberry, a wildlife biologist and member of Florida Citizens for Science, was the target of one of these search and destroy attempts. However, rather than bow to ReputationDefender\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s demands \u00e2\u20ac\u201c on behalf of Dr. Yecke \u00e2\u20ac\u201c to remove or modify his historical information about Dr. Yecke, Dr. Elsberry researched the incident. He discovered proof that Dr. Yecke had in fact said that teaching intelligent design could be done by local school districts. A television station has video of Dr. Yecke herself talking about this very subject during the relevant time frame.<\/p>\n

Dr. Elsberry and Florida Citizens for Science is not concerned about Dr. Yecke having possibly changed her position concerning evolution and the various attacks it attracts. We are, however, very concerned about her trying to scrub a truthful historical record of her past views and actions. Why not just state her current position rather than try to forcefully revise history? As Florida undergoes a revision of the Sunshine State Standards in science, we are concerned about history repeating itself.<\/p>\n

Here is a list of links outlining this controversy:<\/p>\n

Original newspaper story containing information about Dr. Yecke and intelligent design (10\/9\/03):
\nhttp:\/\/www.ecm-inc.com\/news\/princeton\/2003\/October\/9standards.html<\/a>
\nDr. Elsberry\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s original Internet posting about this subject (scroll about halfway down the page) and a copy of the e-mail from ReputationDefenders:
\nhttp:\/\/austringer.net\/wp\/?p=141<\/a>
\nPrevious Florida Citizens for Science news release about this issue:
\nhttp:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=232<\/a>
\nNewspaper story about Dr. Yecke hiring ReputationDefender (6\/26\/07):
\nhttp:\/\/www.sptimes.com\/2007\/06\/26\/State\/Candidate__Story_on_m.shtml<\/a>
\nDr. Elsberry\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s followup Internet posting about his research into the issue:
\nhttp:\/\/austringer.net\/wp\/?p=626<\/a>
\nVideo showing Dr. Yecke talking about intelligent design:
\nhttp:\/\/video1.tpt.org:8080\/ramgen\/almanac\/show\/1852.rm?start=8:23\u00c2\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The following news release was submitted to Florida media. New Information Points to Dr. Yecke Trying to Revise History Dr. Cheri Pierson Yecke is apparently trying to revise history and has now been caught in the act. There is a … 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":[6],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-3O","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":232,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=232","url_meta":{"origin":236,"position":0},"title":"Yecke Information Challenged","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 25, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"-- Updated: Story about Yecke in the St. Petersburg Times.\u00c2\u00a0-- The following press release has been sent out to Florida media: Internet Company Tries to Sanitize Old Information about Yecke Dr. Cheri Pierson Yecke, K-12 chancellor for Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Department of Education, has apparently hired a company called ReputationDefender to search\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Alert"","block_context":{"text":"Alert","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=6"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":226,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=226","url_meta":{"origin":236,"position":1},"title":"Poking Yecke","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 12, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"An Orlando Sentinel newspaper columnist pokes Cheri Yecke a little concerning the\u00c2\u00a0open education commissioner job: Keep an eye on . . . Cheri Yecke. The state's education-commissioner job is vacant. And, as the state's K-12 chancellor, Yecke might seem like a likely applicant. But that would be a mistake. Jeb\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":281,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=281","url_meta":{"origin":236,"position":2},"title":"Oh no! Yecke in the top three.","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"September 18, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Your top three candidates for Florida Education Commissioner are: Joseph Marinelli, Eric Smith and Cheri Yecke. Here are some good points made by the Palm Beach Post: Pick an education leader who will break with Jeb Cheri Pierson Yecke is the kind of candidate to avoid. ... Dr. Yecke followed\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Alert"","block_context":{"text":"Alert","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=6"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":241,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=241","url_meta":{"origin":236,"position":3},"title":"Dembski misses the point","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"July 9, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Mr. Dembski over at his Uncommon Descent blog notices\u00c2\u00a0the Cheri Yecke controversy, but completely misses the point. In his post he blames Dr. Elsberry for stirring the pot. Ummmmm ... what? Did he not read the actual article? It's Yecke who \"stirred the pot,\" not Elsberry. Elsberry was responding to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "On the Web"","block_context":{"text":"On the Web","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=9"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":242,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=242","url_meta":{"origin":236,"position":4},"title":"Education Commissioner application deadline looms","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"July 10, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"This week is the home stretch for accepting applications for Florida Education Commissioner. Friday is the deadline to turn in the paperwork. This article says that State Rep. Joe Pickens isn't going to apply. The story goes on to say: His withdrawal leaves several front-runners for the position: Jim Warford,\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":186,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=186","url_meta":{"origin":236,"position":5},"title":"What Minnesota went through","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"March 24, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Yesterday I posted about Cheri Yecke's desire to be Florida education commissioner. A commenter at Pharyngula reminded me of a post done a few years back at our old blog site about Minnesota's fight over the state science standards when Yecke was there. I'm reposting it here for easy reference.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Our Science Standards"","block_context":{"text":"Our Science Standards","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236"}],"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=236"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}