New Mexico’s public education secretary said last week the state will adopt widely used school science standards in their entirety in response to public outrage over proposed changes that omitted references to global warming, evolution, and the Earth’s age.
Christopher Ruszkowski said a final version of the New Mexico standards would replicate the Next Generation Science Standards developed by a consortium of states, with a half-dozen added passages tied to local accomplishments in science and industry.
An earlier proposal contained about 35 New Mexico-related passages—detracting from the core mission of science education in the eyes of many critics. A public hearing on the earlier version drew scores of impassioned pleas for the state to reconsider and adopt an unedited template. The critics included leading scientists from Los Alamos National Laboratory, science teachers’ associations, faith leaders, teachers, and administrators.
