Conservative plans to grant schools freedom from central control risk bringing the creationist doctrines of a “Religious Right” into the classroom, Ed Balls, the Education Secretary warned
It is fine and dandy to teach 5 year olds about sex and drugs, but government forbid, we should teach an alternative to evolutionism and encourage critical thinking by also offering intelligent design.
Conservative plans to grant schools freedom from central control risk bringing the creationist doctrines of a “Religious Right” into the classroom, the Government warned last night.
Ed Balls, the Education Secretary, this week introduced new rules making the study of Darwin’s theory of evolution compulsory in primary schools. Previous guidance has banned Biblically derived ideas that the Earth and species were created suddenly within the past 10,000 years from science lessons.
Yesterday Mr Balls told The Times that Conservative policies to remove “prescriptions” under the National Curriculum and create hundreds of new independently controlled state schools posed “a real threat to the integrity of science teaching”. He added: “Creationist dogma, whether home grown or from the extreme Religious Right in America, has no place in our science classrooms.”
Michael Gove, the Shadow Education Secretary, said: “No school which receives state money could teach creationism as if it was science.” He indicated that this would be enforced through funding agreements rather than the National Curriculum.
Tags: Education