Battle brewing over earth-science classes in Texas schools
By Dave Ferman
Fort Worth Star-Telegram Staff Writer
Sunday, Mar. 14, 2004
http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/8188015.htmRobin Hood funding, No Child Left Behind requirements, hemorrhaging school district budgets -- Texas education sure isn't lacking for divisive issues these days.
Still, a quietly intense battle is under way over which science courses will be core requirements in state high schools.
The debate is whether two earth-science courses should be options for the three core science classes that students need to graduate.
Supporters say it's as basic as knowing about planet Earth -- land and oil and water.
Opponents say they're trying to avoid a disaster in which scores of students could fail to graduate.
There's not much middle ground.
The controversy has aroused interest in oil industry's power corridors: Both Herbert Hunt of Dallas' Hunt oil empire and Arthur R. Green, chief geoscientist with Exxon Mobil, have testified before the State Board of Education on the issue.
At the same time, the debate has divided, sometimes bitterly, board members and science teachers.
Those who want earth science to remain elective, including Pat Hardy, the board's District 11 representative, say making it a core course will hurt students' chances of passing the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills test and graduating from high school.
"The problem is, the earth-science course wouldn't prepare students for TAKS," said Hardy, whose district includes several Tarrant County school districts. "This would be setting kids up to fail. The test is set up around chemistry, biology and physics."
But those who support earth science as a core subject, including state board Chairwoman Geraldine "Tincy" Miller, say a good working knowledge of earth sciences helps students better understand their world.
And that, they say, could affect everything from where they buy a house to whether they can deal with their septic tank to whom they vote for.
"Earth sciences teach everything about the Earth and how to protect it -- what better thing to know?" Miller said. "I can't understand people being against something so good and useful."
The issue will be decided May 7, when, after a day of testimony, the 15-member board is expected to take a second, final vote. If the resolution passes, earth science would become a core subject in the 2005-06 school year.
Most students would take earth science in 11th grade as geology/meteorology/oceanography, or GMO. The class would join chemistry, biology, physics, integrated physics/chemistry and Principles of Technology I as core choices, said Chris Castillo Comer, director of science for the Texas Education Agency.
An infrequently taught class, Advanced Placement Environmental Science, would also become a core subject, she said.
Education groups are drawing up position papers and jockeying for face time with board members.
Among them are the Earth Science Task Force and the Metroplex Area Science Supervisors. The latter, which wants to keep earth science an elective, is headed by Terry Dickson, an education coordinator with the Grapevine-Colleyville school district.
Everybody agrees on one thing: The May 7 vote will be close -- very close.
"There's not a lot of love lost on both sides," said William Lutz, managing editor of The Lone Star Report, an Austin newsletter covering Texas politics and government. "There's a lot of board members on the fence right now. People who want this and people who don't are going to have to work all 15 board members -- it's good old political advocacy."
Outdoor appeal
The day is gorgeous, warm and sunny, and Haltom High School's Matthew Simmons is giving his students an unexpected treat -- class outdoors.
After a short walk on the trails past the sports fields, they gather in groups of three to five in a pavilion and start to work on the day's assignment, mock TV weather broadcasts. One will come from the North Pole, one from a hurricane-wracked East Coast, and so on.
Simmons teaches two GMO courses, and today is the introduction to meteorology. It's also, he said, a perfect example of why earth science is so interesting and vital.
"This class is all head knowledge, hands-on, and it's the kind of stuff kids gravitate to," he said. "It has a different appeal -- kids can extrapolate to the nth degree."
Haltom High began offering the class three years ago, he said, because students requested it, and enrollment has doubled each year. Students learn about season cycles, find fossils -- including shark teeth -- in a dry creek bed, test soil samples and so on.
How, Simmons asks, can that not be good for them?
"If all we're doing is teaching to TAKS, and they're not interested in it, we're forcing them into a round hole -- and most kids are square pegs," he said. "All kids can't excel in mathematics. I'd rather a kid do well in my class and get a good grade than sit in physics and beat his head against the wall and barely pass."
With about 10 minutes left in the class, the groups do their broadcasts. The one from the North Pole features a student as a polar bear, and the one from the eye of the hurricane has a slim girl pretending to hang on to a tree for dear life. As the class returns to the school, Simmons brings up the rear.
"We don't want to limit the kids to the experiences they will have," he said. "They'll forget some things in the classroom, but they'll remember this."
Testing worries
Most students who would take earth science as a core class would do so in 11th grade, Comer said. And that, Hardy and others say, would mean that some essentials for the TAKS test -- physics, chemistry or biology -- would be taken a year before the test.
"That raises the biggest concerns," said John Doughney, Grapevine-Colleyville's director of curriculum and instruction. "Why would we want to put students in a high-stakes testing situation and remove them from content they'll be held accountable for?"
Also, Drew Scheberle, outreach director of the Texas Business and Education Coalition, said a recent study showed an average 2.3-point drop in ACT scores of students who do not take the chemistry-biology-physics sequence.
"Chemistry is about being precise, and so is physics," said Scheberle. "Earth science is not. At some point, kids have to learn that, to give precise answers."
Comer said the controversy is a "very layered onion."
"People are pretty polarized -- some people are calling this the earth-science wars," she said. "It's so difficult because both sides, in essence, are right."
The controversy came to a head Feb. 27 when, after a week's notice, the issue of earth science as a core subject was put to a vote at a board meeting in Austin. Before the vote, more than 20 people, including Hunt, spoke in favor of earth science as a core subject.
Was the relatively short notice an end run, a power play by pro-earth-science forces? Yes and no, Lutz said.
"There was the yearlong task-force study, but normally, people get a couple of weeks' notice," he said. "And it wasn't included in the first printing of the board's agenda book. It wasn't illegal, but it was a surprise."
Dickson said: "It seemed to us an end run. It was kind of stealth."
The resolution passed, 9-5, setting up the vote May 7.
The board will have many issues to consider, but almost no one on either side will even guess how many students could be affected.
Hardy and Miller say far more than the current 5,000-plus students would probably take earth science. Comer said the increase would be "dramatic."
Kevin Fisher, secondary science supervisor for the Lewisville school district and staunchly in favor of keeping earth-science electives, said 200,000 students may take them.
Even an increase of half that would be enormous, and nobody would say how much that might cost districts and taxpayers.
The cost would be "minimal," according to task-force leader Edward Roy, a distinguished professor of geology at Trinity University in San Antonio.
Simmons agreed, noting that new textbooks, mineral samples and so on would cost "a few thousand dollars" per school.
"It wouldn't be in the millions for each district," he said. "They don't spend that now on any science class."
But Hardy said the price could be in the millions.
"It's ludicrous to think this wouldn't cost anything," she said. "It would cost to provide the textbooks and update the material. And labs could possibly need to be changed. And you have to change the master schedule for the schools."
But much of the testimony in May may not be about dollars but about how rigorous earth-science core courses would be.
Opponents such as Hardy say earth-science classes aren't as difficult as other science courses. She says earth-science courses might well become "remedial" for those who fail the 10th-grade TAKS test.
"That's what a lot of schools will be doing," she said. "And kids will still get out of school unprepared. They may skim by on the test, but their knowledge of science will be very weak."
Proponents said earth-science classes aren't and won't be "dumbed down."
"It's not a lower-level course," Miller said. "We want challenging courses, and we want kids to learn and be ready to get out here in the real world and go and become an astronaut, to make a difference in science. This won't hurt students at all -- it will help them learn other sciences better."
And in the end, all the debate may mean that students will take four science courses, which everyone on both sides agrees is necessary, as do interested parties such as Scheberle.
"The best approach would be four years," he said. "Our students aren't taking too much science. That's not the problem. And we're not saying earth sciences aren't valuable. They build on the information you learn in chemistry, biology and physics."
But Miller is adamant -- she wants earth-science classes in the core subjects first, and then, "hopefully, one day, we can have four sciences."
But Hardy is adamant, too.
"It's opening up a Pandora's box," she said. "When you open this up, does it mean everybody gets a chance to come back to the table to try to change the curriculum willy-nilly? This train has left the station."
Dave Ferman, (817) 685-3957, dferman@star-telegram.com