Science education

I am a retired high school biology teacher, and currently a developer and webmaster for ENSIweb, a non-profit educational web site with excellent classroom-tested, student-centered lessons for teaching the nature of science and the nature of evolution, realistically <http://www.indiana.edu/~ensiweb>  Most of the lessons were created and/or adapted by experienced and effective biology teachers during 6 years of ENSI workshops, 1989-1996.

My deep involvement with these topics has made me painfully aware of the extreme extent of illiteracy in science in this country.  There are considerable misconceptions about what science is, how it works, what it's supposed to do, and its limits.  As a result, much of the population (including, I'm afraid, many teachers at all levels) is very misinformed, and passes that misinformation on to others.  In our increasingly technological and internationally competitive world, we cannot continue to produce so many miseducated citizens.  We are badly in need of massive re-education in these topics, and in other topics in science whose understanding and support depends heavily on an accurate scientific literacy, such as medical science, biotechnology, modern agriculture, environmental concerns, and the important role of evolution in these topics.

As for my deeper ties to California education, I am a product of K-16 (plus a year of teacher training) in California public schools and a state university, from 1939-1956.  I recall my first awareness of California's relative educational "inferiority" when I was in about the 5th grade, moved with my parents due to my Dad's military posting, and transferred to an Oklahoma school for about 6 months during WWII, and found that I was significantly behind the students in my class there.  Nevertheless, I feel I received a pretty good education overall.  My three sons all did their K-16 in the California public system, and I currently have 4 grandchildren going through the system.  I want to do all I can to improve the quality of their education and the education of their children.