DEMOCRAT & CHRONICLE
LOCAL & STATE
B Section
Sunday, February 20, 2000

GROUP URGES WATCH ON SCHOOL

Questions about whether charter school will teach creationism prompts note
to state.

By staff writer
Gary Craig

The People for the American Way is urging state education officials to
closely monitor a planned Rochester charter school to ensure that it does
not teach creationism alongside evolution.

Officials with the New York chapter of People for the American Way, a
liberal organization that works to ensure constitutional separation of
church and state, last week wrote the State University of New York board of
trustees about the Rochester Leadership Academy charter school.

Officials with People for the American Way were not available for comment
yesterday, but the letter notes that they are concerned the school will
promote creationism as a concept as scientifically valid as evolution. To do
so would breach the constitutional separation of church and state by
emphasizing creationism, a religious belief, the organization said in its
letter.

"Evolution is not a guess, and creationism is not a scientific theory," said
Martha Laties, chairwoman of Monroe Citizens for Public Education and
Religious Liberty. Laties says that it’s scientifically unsound to give
creationism equal weight with evolution.

Laties first brought the issue to the attention of People for with American
Way.

Officials with the Rochester Leadership Academy say they will "take an
evolutionary approach to the history of the world" in their curriculum.

The Rochester Leadership Academy is one of the publicly funded charter
schools approved by the state. It is slated to open this fall.

Questions about the school’s curriculum arose after John Walker, who headed
the school’s application, said at a public forum in December that
creationism may be discussed along with evolution at the Academy.

Walker, an assistant business professor at Roberts Wesleyan College, said
yesterday that "we’re not in our curriculum teaching creationism at all."

Instead, he said, evolution will be taught, but students might be told there
are other theories. Students would then be told it’s best to speak with
their parents about other theories, he said.

National Heritage Academies, a Michigan-based company, will head the
Rochester Academy and crafted the curriculum.