The Subtle Bias of the Courier-Journal Shows Itself Again

I will be commenting on an online story today in the Louisville Courier-Journal today about Fayette County Family Court Judge Tim Philpot's recent remarks critical of same-sex marriage to a religious group over the next couple of days. In the meantime I'll just remark that the dishonesty of the media reaches proportions that are sometimes epically astounding. 

The CJ titled the online version of the piece, "Family judge: Gay marriage like 'jumbo shrimp'." 

C'mon.

I'd love to attribute the headline to the simple ignorance of the kind I encounter all the time when I use an analogy about a relationship between two things and the person responding just doesn't get the difference between the similarity of two things (which is not what this kind of analogy expresses) and the similarity of two relationships between two pairs of things (which is what this kind of analogy does express).

For example, in a discussion the other day, a person protested my comparison between the idea that you can choose your gender based on your feelings and that you can choose your race based on your feelings. If the latter is unacceptable, then why is the former acceptable? The person's response was: "You cannot try to compare race with ... sexual identity. What you are doing is called a logical fallacy."

Uh, no. Sorry. 

A comparison of the process by which you determine gender and the process by which you determine race is not a comparison of gender and race. You are not saying "Gender is comparable to race"; you are saying "The relationship between the way we feel about our gender and what our gender actually is is the same as the relationship between the way we feel about our race and our what our race actually is. 

A is to B as C is to D—Not A is similar to B.

And the similarity of these two relationships is unmistakable, which is why someone who is actually male who thinks he is female is just as preposterous (in fact, even more so, since gender goes deeper than race) as Rachel Dolezel, the former chairman of the NAACP who, despite actually being White, claims she is Black because she feels Black—a point not dissimilar to the one Philpot was making.

The fact that people no longer get this is a commentary, not only on the general decline in the ability to think, but in the decline of the ability to think analogically. Maybe this is why the College Board took analogies out of the SAT after years of declining scores in that section.

Philpot did not say that "gay marriage is like jumbo shrimp"; he said “Same sex marriage to me is an oxymoron…kind of like jumbo shrimp." Not only is that a completely different statement, but a true one. The primary argument of those opposed to same-sex marriage is that it violated the very definition of marriage. Philpot's remarks are only another colorful way of making the same point.

Of course, I'm not averse to attributing ignorance to journalists. It abounds. In this case, however, the obfuscation of Philpot's position in the way the headline was written was clearly the result of media bias against anyone who questions the Politically Correct position on gender, which, if you're on the lookout for goofy things, ought to stick out like a sore thumb.

So, while much of the story is quite fair and some of it not entirely unflattering, the CJ (I don't know whether it was Andy Wolfson or an online editor) was clearly banking on peoples' ignorance about how analogies work to distort what Philpot actually said. They also had to know that, however fair much of the story was, the headline is what people will remember. 

This is the subtle way that media bias works, and it's a commentary on the integrity of newspapers like the CJ that they do this kind of thing on a regular basis.

Does JCPS need its head examined for hiring 15 more mental health counselors?

Jefferson County Public Schools (JCPS) are hiring 15 more mental health counselors in order to "decrease barriers to learning." Of course, there are some who would say that JCPS itself is a barrier to learning.

Public school educators have somehow gotten the idea that if you divert your resources into non-academic areas, it will help academics. No one has apparently noticed that the more time and money we spend trying to make schools into umbrella social service agencies, the less well they seem to do.

One wonders about the relative benefits of 15 new mental health counselors rather than, say, 15 new math or reading teachers.

It makes sense to me, but, then again, I don't have an education degree.

Giant sinkhole that swallowed eight Corvettes a Godsend

By now everyone has heard that a giant sinkhole opened up under the Skydome building at the Corvette Museum in Bowling Green, Kentucky, swallowing eight classic Corvettes.

Now if the Corvette Museum is like a lot of similar attractions, it has a hard time attracting visitors. So here's my idea of how to make lemonade out of lemons.

Think about this. Eight classic Corvettes is a nice thing to see. But you've probably already seen all eight of these cars some time in your life. But eight classic Corvettes swallowed by a sinkhole? When was the last time you saw that?

I would call it, "Gulp: The Corvette Exhibit that Shook the Earth."

I have never bothered to go to the Corvette Museum, even though it is less than a two hour drive. But I would go to that exhibit.

If the Museum operators have the slightest marketing imagination, then once it has been determined that the Skydome structure is safe for visitors, they should not take the Corvettes out of the hole. Leave them there. Open up the exhibit as is, and announce that people can now see eight classic Corvettes swallowed by a giant sinkhole.



Just watch the crowds come.

Just for the record, there is no need, Corvette Museum officials out there, to thank me for this idea. Don't even think about sending me, oh, say, six free museum admissions for my family.

Seriously.

Group calls Governor's Common Core comments “warmed over KERA rhetoric”

From yesterday's press release:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 8, 2014

LEXINGTON, KY—"We've already done KERA. Why are we doing it again?" asked a spokesman for The Family Foundation after last night's comments by Gov. Beshear on the Common Core initiative. Martin Cothran called Kentucky's Common Core initiative a "warmed over version of the Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1990 (KERA)," which the group pointed to as a colossal failure.

"It's ironic that the very year we were all supposed to get out our party hats and celebrate the success of the 1990 reforms in Kentucky is the year we are talking about all the problems we have to solve in our schools."

Cothran, spokesman for the group and a professional educator himself, cited KERA's goal of all schools being "proficient" by 2014. "This year was the year our schools were supposed to have been cured of their education ills under the 1990 reforms. Instead, we have to listen to the same failed rhetoric we had to endure 25 years ago."

"Kentucky's version of the Common Core initiative is a rehash of old education ideas that were trotted out in the 1990s and have been completely discredited. Listening to the Governor's comments last night on Kentucky's supposedly 'new' education efforts made it sound like the Governor was reading the KERA playbook of 1990."

Cothran pointed specifically to the segment in the Governor's speech when he pitted basic content knowledge against thinking skills: "Core Content [sic] plays down rote memorization," said Beshear, "and instead gives students the skills that today's workplace demands: creating and critical thinking, problem solving, collaboration, creativity, and communication."

"This is almost word for word what people like former State Education Commissioners Thomas Boysen and Bill Cody, State Sen. Ed Ford and other KERA advocates were telling us we were doing in 1990. It didn't work then and it won't work now.”

Cothran pointed to the false dichotomy education reformers are always invoking between memorization and content knowledge on the one hand and thinking skills on the other. "To say we're not going to memorize anymore and teach thinking skills instead is like Coach Calapari saying, 'My team is going to play down the fundamentals and instead give players what today's NBA needs: three point shots, crossover and spin dribbles, behind the back passes, and change of pace fakes'."

"It’s simply ludicrous to say that there is something wrong with memorization and that it detracts from thinking skills and creativity. The Governor's comments are a bad sign for education prospects in this state."

###

Richard Day: Opposition to science standards a plot by coal companies

I posted a comment on the most recent silliness coming from Richard Day's blog, where anti-religious conspiracy theories take the place of rational arguments. Richard's most recent fantasy involves The Family Foundation taking coal money to advocate against climate change.

Seriously.

Maybe, as I point out my response, which I have included below, that is why I have publicly opposed mountain-top removal.

These are the people who are going to be teaching your children "critical thinking skills."

I'm not sure quite what Richard means when he says that I will "go with whatever argument gets [me] movement." Is he saying that I try to use the best arguments for my position? If so, I'm fail to understand what the problem with that is. Is he implying that I use arguments that I don't believe in myself? If so, he's questioning my motives. 

When you start questioning people's motives, it usually means you don't have much in the way of arguments. You owe it to your opponent in an argument to refute his best arguments, not his worst motives. 

The problem with Richard and some of his readers is that they can't seem to answer the main argument I presented, which is that the standards are weak on content knowledge (which they are). Instead, they launch off into speculation about my being a closet creationist (which I'm not) and go off into spinning conspiracy theories about me wanting to foist my religion on everyone. 

Richard and his followers don't have a shred of evidence for this, so they have to manufacture things. 

For example: that The Family Foundation of Kentucky's "new interest" in the climate change issue (the only comment in regard to which I can even remember being the two or three paragraphs in that one op ed) is due to "donations from pro-coal interests." 

This is absolutely false. In fact, it's pretty close to a smear. But that was conspiracy theorists do: they charge their opponents with things that they don't have a shred of proof for that make them feel comfortable in their own ignorance. Charges like this are not only reckless, they are ethically questionable and they don't belong in a civilized exchange of beliefs. 

And besides, how does this charge square with my publicly-stated opposition to mountain-top removal? 

One thing you can say for Richard, he can pack a lot of falsehoods into one pretty brief comment. He claims that I "roused up church folks to go testify." I presume he means at the recent Administrative Regulations Review Subcommittee meeting in which the science standards were rejected.  

In fact, although The Family Foundation urged people to call legislators (because of the content issue), no one in that organization, including myself, ever asked anyone to go to the meeting to testify. In fact, when the chairman asked for the seventeen people who had signed up to testify against the regulation to decide among themselves which one would speak for them, Richard Innes of the Bluegrass Institute and I went to the table and told the chairman that we had no idea who the other 15 people even were, so it was hard for us to "decide." It was then he allowed both of us to speak briefly--in a smaller space of time than the advocates got to give their case. 

But even if it were true we were "rousing up church folks" to testify at the meeting, how would that act be "specifically anti-evolution"? 

I think the real answer is for Richard and his friends to get out more. Maybe actually acquainting himself with religious people would help him realize that they don't go around thinking anti-evolution thoughts all day. It also might diminish the necessity of him having to lay awake nights worrying that someone, somewhere might be thinking creationist thoughts if he realized that not all people who take their religion seriously are creationists. 

But the best thing to do is to stop trying to discern people's private thoughts just because they can't answer their public arguments.

You can read more about the secret plot by Christians to foist a knowledge of nature on poor, helpless school children here.

More Science Follies: UK science professor defends former professor who says that scientific method is a Medieval superstition

Someone must have spiked the contents of the water cooler over at the faculty lounge of the University of Kentucky's science department.

Yesterday's claim by a former UK science professor in the comments section of my Lexington Herald-Leader op-ed that the scientific method is obsolete is being defended by a current UK science professor.

Our own Art, a UK science professor now under the influence of the Next Generation Science Standards Kool-Aid, says that his former colleague "can be excused" for saying that the teaching of the scientific method is "a return to early 13th century standards in teaching science."

Why?

Because, says Art (still clearly suffering the after-effects of one cup too many), I believe science consists of "rote memorization of Latin names" and think scientific inquiry consists of falling "on your knees and ask[ing] the voices in your heads for the answer."

This is not the first time Art has suffered such hallucinations, but I think maybe the Kool-Aid touched off an unusually serious visitation.

Perhaps he should seek some kind of treatment for this. I suggest an emetic, followed immediately by a laxative, followed by frequent repetitions of this same regimen over a period of several days. It may not make him feel better, but a few of the rest of us will certainly be cheered by it.

Of course, it might just be the result of his humors being out of balance, in which case a good bloodletting might be in order.

I wouldn't be surprised if he couldn't find a leechmaster right there in the UK science department. I mean, after all, I understand they still practice the scientific method there.

Scientificus Contralogicus

If you can't deal with someone's argument, simply change the subject something completely unrelated.

In response to my op-ed on the science standards in yesterday's Herald-Leader, we get this from Paul Vincelli, an extension professor and Provost's Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Kentucky who apparently wandered into the comment section of my op-ed from a totally different article:

I use the word "theory" in the sense of modern science: a set of well-established concepts that fit observations. In other words, no one doubts the existence of electricity, our understanding of which is based on the theories of electromagnetism, atomic structure, and quantum mechanics. In that sense of the word "theory", the theory of evolution and the theory of human-influenced climate change are fundamental to modern science. 

This is in response to my argument that the Next Generation Science Standards Kentucky just implemented are lacking in content knowledge. Don't you see the argument?

Evolution and global warming are fundamental to modern science
Therefore, content knowledge of nature is not fundamental to modern science

Maybe we should just take this as an indication of what is coming in the "critical thinking skills" program that the Common Core people still haven't produced.

Scientific method obsolete, says defender of state science standards

Okay class, next question: Which planet are defenders of science standards from?

Here is Tom Kimmerer, a former science professor at the University of Kentucky, responding to my article in yesterday's Lexington Herald-Leader:

Mr. Cothran is trying to blur what his organization is after: a return to early 13th century standards in teaching science. The scientific method, consisting of observation, hypothesis, experimentation, and independent verification, was developed beginning in the mid-1200s, mainly by the clergy of several faiths. It is absolutely in the interest of all Kentuckians that we teach our children a 21st century view of science. Children are natural-born scientists, observing, playing and hypothesis testing in a natural way. Mr. Cothran wants to wring this ability out of students by appealing to didactic fundamentalism. Those of us who live in the current century should thank the Governor for ignoring the forces of ignorance.

Oh my. The scientific method. A medieval superstion. I think. I'm going. To laugh now.

Defenders of science standards way ahead of their time

Why is it that proponents of the Next Generation Science Standards want to inject religion into the discussion of the standards?

In response to my op-ed in the Herald-Leader today, Pete Landfield, who is involved in Information Systems at the University of Kentucky, says, "Let's all remember that the "family foundation" is a religious group comprised of right wing evangelical 'christian' dominionists."

 Really? Is he talking about me? I'm a Catholic, which makes it theologically impossible for me to be a "dominionist."

Amazing the strange bedfellows that reckless stereotyping can make.

But Landfield, the informationally challenged information systemetizer, goes on: "What Mr. Cothran fails to remember is that there is a separation of church and state in this country, and teaching religion in the public sphere is prohibited. If Mr. Cothran were to get his way and have right wing evangelical 'christian' version of creationism taught and climate science ignored, then I say we should also teach Satanism, Voodoo, Hoodoo, Hinduism, Buddhism, Wiccanism, paganism, and lest I forget, Flying Spaghetti Monstorism in school. After all, isn't that the jist of religious 'freedom'?"

And I recommended teaching religion ... where?

Had Landfield paid attention to the informational aspect of what I said he would have noticed a curious fact: That I not only made no recommendation to teach religion, but made no reference to religion whatsoever. So what exactly is he referring to? It's hard to say.

In pondering the kind of intellectual care Landfield and other commenters on the article take in interpreting what I actually said in the article, I'm seeing some interesting things in our scientific future.

I'm thinking of alchemy and leechcraft here.

My article on the sham approval process of state science standards in today's Herald-Leader

Here is an excerpt of my op-ed on Kentucky's science standards in today's Lexington Herald-Leader:

This is the problem with science education, we are told: students have memorized too many facts. Their heads are bursting with them. There is not enough room in their tiny little brains for an understanding of how these facts should be applied because all the room is currently taken up by facts. There is simply no space in those fact-crowded little heads for scientific applications. 

This may be the first time anyone has argued that the problem with our schools is that students know too much.

Read more here.

New JCPS Slogan: "Not as bad as we used to be, but almost"

Jefferson County Public Schools have reportedly (in stories that were the journalistic equivalent of happy faces) improved under Kentucky's new "Unbridled Learning" assessment system, but not much, according to the Louisville Courier-Journal:

In Jefferson County, 41 percent of the district’s elementary students, 42 percent of middle-schoolers and 52 percent of high-schoolers scored proficient or better in reading, compared with last year’s rates of 42 percent, 38 percent and 51 percent, respectively.

And behind these lackluster numbers was this little tidbit:

Overall, JCPS saw a decline in three areas — elementary reading, middle school science and high school math.

If you can't teach students to read in elementary school, then the future is not bright. And high school math? It's not pretty:

Math proficiency fell slightly, ranging by grade level from 33 to 41 percent proficiency, compared with 33 to 46 percent last year.

In fact, some schools tanked altogether:

All of the district’s high schools scored worse this year in algebra II end-of-course exams. Nine schools — Butler, Doss, Manual, Fern Creek, Iroquois, Male, Pleasure Ridge Park, Southern and Western — posted double-digit declines in the subject.

Double digit declines. And, overall, only 23 percent of schools in Jefferson count scored proficient.

All this after having adopted Common Core standards in 2010. But the important thing is that the school unions are still in control and that teachers colleges are still the gatekeepers of teacher training.

Have a nice day.

As state funding for KY schools declines, performance improves

The announcement by Kentucky education officials yesterday of alleged improvements in the state's school system over the last few years may be the fulfillment of the prophecy of a famous Kentuckian.

After I introduced Wendell Berry last year at the CiRCE Institute Padeia Prize banquet, he said, "I think our education system is too big to fail, but I also think it's too big to fix—without a lot less money. Perhaps poverty will do them some good."

With this in mind, did anyone happen to notice that the day after all these great improvements in Kentucky schools since 2010 were announced (reduction in dropout rates, greater college and career readiness), the Lexington Herald-Leader, in an impeccably-timed editorial today, complained about the decline in state education funding since 2008?

Now it's rather humorous that the Herald-Leader editors would be complaining about something having a negative effect that actually had a direct correlation with education improvement!

And furthermore we could give this correlation scientific legitimacy by merely conferring an acronym on it and using scientific lingo to describe it. Let's call it the FREIE (The Funding Reduction Education Improvement Effect) which represents the research-based conclusion of the correlation which we observe in the data indicating the need for a repurposing of our cognitive presumptions given the fact that decreases in education expenditures seem to contribute to the conclusion that educational infrastructures problematize the cognitive outcome that increases in expenditure generate critical proficiencies.

(Why is it that I feel like taking a shower after I say something like that?)

Think about it: If a decline in educational funding of ten percent correlates with the kind of improvement Kentucky officials are now claiming, just imagine how much Kentucky schools could be improved by, say, a 20 percent or even 30 percent funding cut.

It's worth a try.

In Defense of Facts: Students know too much, say science standards advocates

While most of us think that it is ignorance that needs to be stamped out, advocates of Kentucky's new unapproved and forcibly implemented science standards are targeting ... knowledge.

Just take a gander at the responses to my opinion piece in the Louisville Courier-Journal which were published on Monday. According to Brad Matthews, former director of curriculum and assessment for the Jefferson County Public Schools, one reason we need these unapproved and forcibly implement standards is to extirpate that bane of all modern permissivist educators: memorization.

"Science education has moved away from the memorization of many facts," says Matthews, "and toward understanding how the laws and principles of science are applied."

That's right: students have memorized too many facts. Their heads are bursting with scientific facts. There is not enough room in their tiny little brains for an understanding of how these facts should be applied because all the room us currently taken up by scientific facts which these students have memorized. There is simply no space in those fact-crowded little heads for scientific concepts.

The solution is obvious to people like Matthews: clear all that knowledge out of there so they will be able to apply the knowledge they will no longer have under these standards.

Just check out some of those Jefferson County schools Matthews had a hand in overseeing and you'll see the extent to which kids are overstuffed with memorized factual knowledge.

What exactly is it that modern educators have against memorized knowledge of facts? And why is it that they are always pitting facts against application and concepts? Is the possession of memorized facts really inconsistent with an ability to apply scientific procedures and an understanding of scientific ideas?

Since we're now abandoning memorization, we can apparently look forward to the prospect of Kentucky students knowing fewer facts than ever before.

What a relief.

Unapproved but forcibly implemented state science standards advocate misrepresents my arguments

Robert Bevins, a former professor of biology at Georgetown College who is probably the most widely-quoted supporter of Kentucky's unapproved but forcibly implemented new science standards, said at a recent legislative hearing that Kentucky would be seen as a "backwater" if it didn't approve the science standards.

The problem is that if the science standards are passed, Kentucky students won't know what a backwater is.

In the legislative committee meeting in which the standards were rejected, Bevins gave testimony asserting that my word counts were incorrect when I asserted, in my Lexington Herald-Leader article, that climate science terms were used 130 times while other terms one would expect to be more common in a set of science standards were far fewer--or absent altogether.

I made some notes while Bevins was speaking, just before I gave may own testimony on Bevins' attempted refutation of my argument. Then, I discovered his more extensive response to my arguments on the website of the group he heads, Kentuckians for Science Education.

Here is what he says in the post on his site responding to my arguments: "An examination of the Next Generation Science Standards by word count and context regarding claims of excessive focus on climate change." He then goes on to give his own findings about what he found in the NGSS document.

First problem: Bevins misrepresents the document I claimed to have analyed
The first thing to note about his response is that he completely misrepresents what I claimed. He says I claimed to have done a word search on the Next Generation Science Standards document: "Mr Cothran’s initial analysis of the NGSS document," he says, "vastly overestimates the importance of anthropogenic climate change in the NGSS document, especially in elementary and middle school grades."

Mr. Bevin's assertion is simply false.

I said very specifically in my op-ed that I did the word search on the Kentucky Core Academic Standards document, which is the actual document in question in this debate. Here are my exact words: "If you do a simple word search through the Kentucky Core Academic Standards document, the problem becomes apparent ..." [Emphasis added]

In other words, Bevins' entire attempted refutation is based on a mistaken understanding of the document at issue.

Now obviously the Kentucky Core Academic Standards includes the Next Generation Science Standards as well as a number of other subject areas. In addition, I have not done a careful comparison between the science sections Kentucky standards document and the NGSS document. I suspect they are substantially the same, although Kentucky Department of Education officials said at the legislative meeting last Wednesday that they had made some modifications which sound minor.

In any case, I never claimed to have done any kind of content analysis on the Next Generation Science Standards document itself, as Bevins claims, and therefore the word counts he claims as corrections of my word counts are irrelevant.

Second problem: Bevins overstates what I said the document emphasized
He also asserted that my word count involved terms related to climate change and that, in fact, the terms I found in my word search were related to climate science in general, but not climate change in particular. What I in fact said was that these were terms related to climate science.

Again, Bevins misrepresents what I said. Here is what I said: "If we had only Kentucky's science standards to go by, we would have to conclude that climate and weather issues are more important than gravity, photosynthesis, electricity, genetics, radiation and quantum mechanics." [Emphasis added] I then said, very specifically, exactly which terms I was counting: "...the terms "climate," "weather" and "global warming" are together mentioned over 130 times."

I did say, prior to those specific claims, that there was "an avalanche of terms related to climate change." I said that because my assumption was that the reason for having all of those climate and weather related terms in the standards was because of the recent interest in climate change. In other words, the prevalence of climate science terminology was my evidence for an emphasis on climate change in the standards.

Now I suppose someone could argue with my assumption that the reason for the inclusion of all the climate science emphasis in the standards is not due to the interest in climate change (and Bevins tries to do this), but that would be rather hard to believe. It would also not square with the responses by standards supporters to my argument, which was not that I was wrong about the emphasis on climate change, but rather that the standards were, in fact, correct in emphasizing it (through an emphasis on climate science). Just see the two responses that appeared to my article in the Herald Leader two weeks later.

In any case, my claims about the data itself had to do specifically and explicitly with climate science terminology.

So the two chief assumptions of Bevins refutation are mistaken.

And in regard to his claim that Kentucky will be seen as a backwater if it doesn't pass the standards, so what? We should mis-educate our children in order not to look bad?

Kentucky children are not stupid

For Immediate Release

September 13, 2013

LEXINGTON, KY—The Family Foundation today decried what it called "ugly rhetoric" from supporters of the state science standards. "Supporters of the science standards need to tone down their criticism of Kentucky students before they make the standards more unpopular than they already are."

Comments made by a liberal blogger and supporters of the standards who testified before a legislative committee in favor of the standards prompted the group to speak out. After the science standards were rejected by a legislative panel yesterday, Jake Payne, who runs Page One, Kentucky, said in response to the vote, "Wondering why Kentucky kids tend to be the dumbest mother****ers on the planet these days? That’s why."

Cothran said the current science standards are not better than previous standards and leave out even more science content. "If Kentucky students were as stupid as Payne thinks they are," said Cothran, "then it would be the result in part of the last set of standards we passed in this state. Remember them? The ones that were supposed to make everything better? The people who are now telling us that the Next Generation Science Standards will fix things are the same people who told us that the Last Generation Science Standards were going to solve our problems. "

"Kentucky children are not stupid. But they are ill-served by an education establishment that ignores basic content knowledge as the new science standards do. And people like Payne should stop blaming children."

###

Media coverage of legislative rejection of Next Generation Science Standards

Below is a list of media outlets carrying my remarks on the rejection by the Administrative Regulation Review Subcommittee of the states new science standards which are based on the Next Generation Science Standards:

Kentucky panel to review state's new science standards

...new standards would be a horrible embarrassment for the state. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards should not be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge...

09/11/13 12:39 | United States | courierpress.com No Title ...new standards would be a horrible embarrassment for the state. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards should not be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/12/13 06:13 | United States | westkentuckystar.com Gov. Beshear overrides decision to spike science standards ...was political. “I pretty well predicted this,” Holliday said. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards shouldn’t be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/12/13 04:26 | United States | state-journal.com Kentucky's new science education standards rejected ...new standards would be a horrible embarrassment for the state. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards should not be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 16:58 | United States | wdrb.com Kentucky legislative panel finds science standards lacking ...new standards would be a horrible embarrassment for the state. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards should not be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 16:27 | United States | wpsdlocal6.com Governor to implement new science standards ...inadequate" and he said the subcommittee vote was political. Martin Cothran , spokesman for The Family Foundation , said the standards shouldn't be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 11:18 | United States | timesunion.com Governor to implement new science standards ...inadequate" and he said the subcommittee vote was political. Martin Cothran , spokesman for The Family Foundation , said the standards shouldn't be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 11:18 | United States | newstimes.com Governor to implement new science standards ...inadequate" and he said the subcommittee vote was political. Martin Cothran , spokesman for The Family Foundation , said the standards shouldn't be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 11:18 | United States | stamfordadvocate.com Governor to implement new science standards ...inadequate" and he said the subcommittee vote was political. Martin Cothran , spokesman for The Family Foundation , said the standards shouldn't be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 11:18 | United States | ctpost.com Governor to implement new science standards ...inadequate" and he said the subcommittee vote was political. Martin Cothran , spokesman for The Family Foundation , said the standards shouldn't be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 10:18 | United States | beaumontenterprise.com Legislative Panel Finds Science Standards Lacking ...new standards would be a horrible embarrassment for the state. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards should not be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 09:26 | United States | lex18.com Governor to implement new science standards ...inadequate" and he said the subcommittee vote was political. Martin Cothran , spokesman for The Family Foundation , said the standards shouldn't be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 08:18 | United Kingdom | sfgate.com Governor to implement new science standards ...inadequate" and he said the subcommittee vote was political. Martin Cothran , spokesman for The Family Foundation , said the standards shouldn't be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 08:18 | United States | seattlepi.com Governor to implement new science standards ...inadequate" and he said the subcommittee vote was political. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards shouldn't be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 04:07 | United States | palmbeachpost.com Legislative panel opposes new science standards | Politics and Governm... ...new standards would be a horrible embarrassment for the state. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards should not be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 01:11 | United States | kentucky.com Legislative panel finds science standards lacking ...new standards would be a horrible embarrassment for the state. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards should not be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/10/13 19:16 | United States | wkyt.com Legislative panel finds science standards lacking | State News ...standards as “low level” and “woefully deficient in engineering.” Martin Cothran of the Family Foundation, another conservative advocacy group, claimed the standards exhibit “an over emphasis on climate control”... 09/11/13 19:09 | United States | thetimestribune.com Governor To Implement New Science Standards ...inadequate" and he said the subcommittee vote was political. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards shouldn't be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 21:09 | United States | lex18.com Local teachers cautiously optimistic about newly proposed science stan... ...practices and critical thinking for kids," said Ladd. It's a move Martin Cothran with The Family Foundation said is a mistake. "That aspect of science which is the most useful for the most students is going... 09/11/13 20:18 | United States | wpsdlocal6.com No Title ...new standards would be a horrible embarrassment for the state. Martin Cothran, spokesman for The Family Foundation, said the standards should not be approved because they neglect basic science knowledge... 09/11/13 19:33 | United States | westkentuckystar.com Legislators finds science standards lacking, but governor orders them... ...standards as “low level” and “woefully deficient in engineering.” Martin Cothran of the Family Foundation, another conservative advocacy group, claimed the standards exhibit “an over emphasis on climate control”... 09/11/13 14:03 | United States | richmondregister.com Blogs 1 new results New Science Standards Defeated in Committee In his testimony* before the committee, Martin Cothran of The Family Foundation criticized the standards ... standards for Kentucky. My name is Martin Cothran, I am with The Family Foundation of Kentucky. I would like... 09/12/13 08:48 | savetherevolution.com No Title I'm saddened, but not surprised by this group. And then I had to listen to Martin Cothran on NPR lamenting the gay agenda on Sunday. Education in Kentucky? An educated Kentucky? Me thinks not... 09/10/13 19:55 | theprincipal.blogspot.com Kentucky governor approves new science curriculum despite conservative... ...basic knowledge about the natural world,” foundation spokesperson Martin Cothran told the Associated Press. But the NGSS still won backing from both the state Board of Education and local education groups... 09/11/13 21:33 | rawstory.com Kentucky School News and Commentary: Kentucky's proposed science standards... Wednesday in the State Capitol Annex in Frankfort. Martin Cothran, senior policy analyst with the conservative ... the Bluegrass Institute and Martin Cothran and those folks have some valid concerns," he said. "We... 09/11/13 10:27 | theprincipal.blogspot.com

PRESS RELEASE: Governor’s action “crisis in educational legitimacy”

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
September 12, 2013 

LEXINGTON, KY—"This creates a crisis of educational legitimacy," said a spokesman for The Family Foundation after Gov. Steve Beshear said he was going to ignore the decision of a legislative panel that voted down controversial new state science standards on Wednesday.

"The Governor has basically told parents to take a hike," said Martin Cothran. "We told the committee that the approval process for these standards was a sham and now the Governor has proven our point." The Kentucky Department of Education had not made a single change to the standards in response to criticism, Cothran had told the committee.

"If there is any doubt that the approval process for education standards is a joke, the Governor has dispelled it." Cothran said that there has only been rag-tag opposition to the standards up to this point. "What was ripple could now turn into a tsunami," said Cothran.

The Family Foundation opposed the standards because they lack an emphasis on basic science knowledge about nature while overemphasizing climate change and other trendy science topics.

###

Kentucky state science standards rejected by legislative committee

LEXINGTON, KY—The state’s science standards were defeated today in a bipartisan vote in a legislative committee. “This is a sign of the level of discomfort many people in this state have with science standards that ignore basic aspects of science in order to make room for trendy topics like climate science.”

In his testimony before the vote, Cothran criticized the standards for ignoring basic scientific knowledge about animals, plants, rocks and minerals. “Half of science is left out of the science standards,” he told the members of the Administrative Regulations Review Subcommittee.

Cothran also criticized the approval process for the science standards and said that, despite all the criticism and comment, the Kentucky Department of Education hadn’t made a single change. “The Department has never intended to change anything. Even the Commissioner of Education said yesterday that there is no way to change them. If that’s correct, then why did we spend all this time going through an approval process?”

The vote seemed to come as a shock to educational officials who seemed simply to assume the legislature would give a rubber stamp. "This is a huge victory for families in Kentucky who want to know that their schools are teaching what they say they are teaching. This was a battle over educational integrity and educational integrity lost."

###

State can't do anything about problems in science standards, says KY commissioner of ed

In today's Lexington Herald-Leader story on Kentucky's science standards, Commissioner of Education Terry Holiday acknowledges that at least some of the criticisms Dick Innes and I have made are valid. The problem is, he says, it's too late to make any changes:

"We certainly recognize that the Bluegrass Institute and Martin Cothran and those folks have some valid concerns," he said. "We want to address the concerns, but we can't go back and revise the standards because they are a 26-state collaboration." 

We can't revise the standards? We just sign on to the Next Generation Science Standards project and we sign our educational integrity away to the feds? Really? You mean we could determine that these standards have problems but we are not allowed to do anything about it?

And what about this whole process of public comment on the regulation we are going through right now and which includes tomorrow's vote on the regulation concerning the standards in a legislative committee? Was this process supposed to just make us feel good--or bad, as the case may be?

Sheeez.

Read more here.

My "Science without Nature" appears in the CJ today

My op-ed on on Kentucky's science standards, based on the Next Generation Science Standards, appears in today's Louisville Courier-Journal here: http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20130909/OPINION04/309090007/Martin-Cothran-School-science-standards-fall-short