The Anti-Anti-Evolution Bill

While some state lawmakers are moving toward implementing "teach the controversy" laws, Louisiana State Senator Karen Carter Peterson has introduced a bill to repeal that state's 2008 education law. According to the AAAS Policy Alert, the 2008 law designated evolution — as well as climate change and the origin of life — as a controversial topic and thus allowed teachers to use supplemental materials to critique it. As Walter Pierce writes at The Independent Weekly, opponents called the bill "a Trojan Horse for creationists." Peterson, though, is working to remove the bill. "Louisiana's top priority must be to educate our children so they can compete for the high-paying jobs that we want to create in Louisiana," she says. The AAAS Policy Alert adds that the Louisiana Act has been the only successfully enacted "academic freedom" bill in the US.