Originally posted on Nola Defender.
Make no mistake: Zack Kopplin, a 17-year-old high school senior from Baton Rouge Magnet who is leading the efforts to repeal the so-called Louisiana Science Education Act, is not your stereotypical science geek. Last November, when he spoke before the LA Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE)'s Textbook Advisory Council about the need to maintain science textbooks that teach actual science, Kopplin wore an orange hoodie and a pair of blue jeans, while he addressed a group of serious-looking adults in serious-looking suits. However, it would have been a mistake to judge the skinny, fresh-faced teenage kid in the blue jeans as anything less than serious. Kopplin, as it turns out, is preternaturally smart and knows a thing or two about doing his homework.
When he addressed the council, the soft-spoken student suddenly became the teacher. "Please stand tall and endorse life science textbooks that teach realscience rather than undermine it," he urged.The council, and eventually the entire BESE Board, took Zack's advice. The council voted 8-4 to keep science in science textbooks, and the BESE Board proceded to vote 6-1 and 8-2 in support of science in subsequent meetings. Zack describes this as "the largest victory for science that Louisiana has had in eight years." Although Kopplin's victory at the BESE Board generated state and national news, including a strong endorsement from his hometown newspaper, The Baton Rouge Advocate, which suggested he could be "the newest giant-killer in state education policy," he's always had his sights on something much bigger: the repeal of the Science Education Act. He will have a shot at achieving that goal during the current legislative session. Sen. Karen Carter-Peterson (D-New Orleans) has introduced a bill to repeal the Act.
The LA Science Education Act is, essentially, a cleverly-phrased attempt to inject religious beliefs, like creationism, into public school science classrooms. It was crafted and promoted by the LA Family Forum, with the assistance of the Discovery Institute, and signed into law in 2008 by Gov. Bobby Jindal, who, ironically, is the proud owner of a degree in biology from Brown University.
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