Student view on creationsim

Last fall in Federal District Court, concerned parents won against the Dover, Pa., School Board’s decision to require the teaching of “intelligent design” (or creationism as it is known in its old days) in science classes, as that policy violated the First Amendment about separation of church and state.

That U.S. Supreme Court case was the most recent legal battle between those who favor or oppose the teaching of evolution in public schools.

North Lake College government professor Dr. Gabriel Bach polled his government students in January 2006 on the topic of creationism using questions borrowed from similar research done recently by Pew, Gallup, NBC and Fox.

• Question 1: Some people think that humans and other living things have existed in their present form since the beginning of time.
• Question 2: Should books that contain dangerous ideas be banned from public school libraries?

Two hundred thirty-five students participated in the survey.

• The sample included 127 females and 108 males.
• Of the sample, 35 are younger than 18; 149 are between the ages of 18 and 24; 22 are between 25 and 29; 25 are older than 30; and 4 did not give their age.
• Politically, 52 consider themselves Republicans, 65 Democrats, 37 independents, 77 students displayed no political preference and 4 students gave no answer.
  56 of those polled are non-US citizens.
• 98 already attended one government class.

Based on question one, 61 percent of those polled believe in creationism, 19 percent do not, 18 percent have no opinion.

The number of believers was among Republicans, with 65 percent of those Republicans polled saying they did believe in creationism, as did 63 percent of Democrats, 60 percent of those with no political preference and 57 percent of Independents.

The poll also found that those who believe in creationism considered themselves to be more politically aware, with 25 percent claiming to follow what is going on in the government and to have voted in the 2004 presidential elections. Only 15 percent of those who do not believe in creationism made the same claim.

Based on question two, 21 percent of those polled agree that books containing “dangerous ideas” should be banned from public libraries. Of them, 55 percent believed in creationism. Only 22 percent of those polled disagree with such a ban and the remainder had no opinion.

National studies have yielded the following results:

• Approximately 40 percent to 50 percent accept the biblical creationist account.
• Creationists tend to be conservative in politics and politically active
• Creationism has a tendency to lead to social inflexibility.

The survey showed that the majority of the NLC government students polled believe in creationism.

Those who said they believe tend to be politically conservative, politically active and inflexible on social issues. The students’ attitudes generally reflect national studies.

— Dr. Gabriel Bach is a government professor and
regular contributor to the News-Register.